The Greatest Journey
by Crystabel.Shalott
Summary: Sometimes the greatest journey is the distance between two people: we are defined by the past, and the facade we put on, and that people see, never represents the whole truth. (Modern day/AU)
1. Chapter 1

**Author's note:** I know that I should update 'Odesta' and 'Now That I Need You Most', and I will. It's just that I have reached the saddest chapters and it's a bit depressing but don't worry there will be an upload soon. This is based on some drabbles I posted on tumblr. Enjoy!

**Disclaimer: **I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 1:

The theater was a large building, with a circular form. It could remind someone of 'The Royal Albert Hall' except it was relatively new: build between twenty and ten years ago. It was placed in the middle of Panem, unfortunately it was a too grand building for the center of the city and was surrounded mainly by shops and a public park, but nothing more. On the inside they didn't pay attention to price and the result was great and elegant but not ordinary. Columns were holding the ceiling, statues were craved in them, and there was a large circular window on the top of it which permitted, in full moon nights, that the light came in illuminating the room and giving to it a fairytale mood.

It was in this theater that the annuals concerts were performed, the most famous was the one involving rising stars in classical music. The most important people frequented it and most of them were already in the middle of their forties. It wasn't exactly an occasion to listen to good music, more the chance to discuss political affair and show off at the party that was usually held afterwards, that lured them there. Thus the lack of young people.

Johanna was sitting in her armchair in the yard of Panem's theater and she was looking herself around. No, the average age was forty-five. Nothing to do. She slipped out of her high heels and sat with her legs crossed, uncaring what other people might have thought about it. Johanna Mason didn't give a shit about other people's opinion, besides she didn't even wanted to be here. It annoyed her: it was all too much. too elegant, too sophisticated, too boring.

Then why was she there? Because she owed Finnick a favor.

He phoned her the other day, telling her he had two tickets for a classic music concert. He said to wear something nice and that he would have given her a lift. And that was it, no more explanations. She hated everything of this situation and she was annoyed. No, she was furious: she knew thousands of different ways to spend an evening, things that didn't include Panem's élite.

There was only one advantage in the whole situation, and it was seeing Finnick in a suit. She started to make fun of him when he came to take her out, and hadn't stop since. She knew it was upsetting him, but in her mind she thought she had the every right to do so, at least they had been equals.

"A reminder Finnick, why have you dragged me here?" she asked.

"Shut up, it's starting"

The lights begun to turn off, leaving the audience in the shadows. The first applauses were made when the presenter of the evening, the famous Caesar Flickerman, walked on stage. Johanna thought that all this people were idiots: anyone could have walked on stage and spoken into a microphone. And they applauded him like it was the hardest job in the world.

"Odair, if I fall asleep during this thing don't bother yourself by waking me up" she whispered in his ear. But Finnick didn't give her the slightest reaction. His sight was captured by something on the side of the stage, something she couldn't distinguish from this distance. Neither could he, considering he was myopic. Unless... Unless he knew who it was.

"Welcome, welcome, welcome! To the new edition of Panem's Proms! As usual we have a large choice of artists of all ages. But before we start, a round of applause for the orchestra and its director Seneca Crane"

Everybody cheered happily and Johanna let out a sight. No way she was going to make it through the whole thing. Two hours of this, she would have died after thirty minutes.

"And now the first star of this evening: piano soloist Annie Cresta performing Beethoven's op 27."

Now everything became clear in Johanna's mind: Finnick's eagerness to come, his gaze turned attentively on stage. He came here for her. Annie Cresta was the girl Finnick had a crush on. And now not only did he talk about her twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. No, he dragged her to her concert too. She could have killed him.

"Seriously you dragged me here for her? Couldn't you just come alone?"

"No, because after this there is a party and we will attend it. She will too. And it will be my big occasion to talk to her"

"You, my friend, are an idiot and I can't understand why you keep trying to get her attention when she is clearly not interested in you"

If Annie Cresta had been interested she would have talked to him by now, She avoided Finnick like the plague: when she saw Finnick in the university's corridors or in the cafeteria she always turned around to walk in the opposite direction and that must have meant something.

"You just can't take no as an answer and that is all"

"Well, I won't give up"

Finnick sighted. He felt like his case was completely hopeless: Annie had been more than clear about the fact that she didn't want to have nothing to do with him. She told him that she didn't like him, and that was okay because most of the time he didn't like himself too. What he wanted to change was the view she had of him.

_'You are a flirt, arrogant, selfish, preener and a peacock' _she said before she walked away, leaving him the standing alone in the corridor. He wanted to tell her the truth, that that wasn't the real Finnick, it was just an act he put on. He showed what people wanted to see, he was scared of getting hurt. Life was easier that way. He enjoyed popularity, that was true. But the rest wasn't. And he wanted to show Annie Cresta that he was serious when he said he liked her, that he wasn't just messing around. So he stopped fooling around, he didn't see other girls and stopped having one night stands. He was trying to better himself, but it wasn't really working. She still ignored him, and it hurt like crazy. He never found himself in a situation like this before but now he understood why they said that love hurts.


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: **I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 2:

The concert had been as boring as hell, only a few performance had been interesting. It was the classical music that wasn't really his thing, but then again he came to see Annie play and she had been brilliant. He never heard her really playing before, but now that he did he was enchanted. He wondered how it was possible for a person to play that fast without having their fingers entwined: practice, obviously. And she must have practiced a lot if she was here performing as soloist at the age of twenty-one, in an important concert as 'Panem's Proms'.

"Ladies and Gentlemen" cheered Caesar Flickerman "For those who decided to join it, the buffet and encounter with the stars of this evening will be hold in the theater's foyer. It will be the occasion for a refreshment with champagne and to natter, we hope you will enjoy the rest of the night"

Everyone started to get up, but Finnick and Johanna waited a moment so that the crowed thinned out. Then Johanna put on her shoes again and followed Finnick in the foyer. To their surprise it didn't seem to be so full of people, it was larger than they imagined it that's for sure. Johanna looked herself around skeptically: one thing was going to a concert the other to an after party. She knew thousands of different ways to spent a Friday night and each of them would have been better than staying here, they would have tried to talk to her. People, she hated people. And she hated the dress she was in, damn she looked like a tree. And the high heels, she despised those too. How was it possible that someone could come here on purpose?

This was torture: everything was posh and false.

"Finnick, you owe me more than one favor. No you owe me for the rest of your fucking life!" she said sourly "This was not even part of the plan!"

"No Jo, it was part of the plan from the very beginning. Not my fault you were not listening. And now we are going to look after Annie together"

"Nope" she said, letting the p come out with a desperate sight "I am going home. Home. And I will throw away this dress that makes me look like a walking fir. Seriously I could put an axe in the stylist's face. What was he thinking about? Anyway I will also burn this heels that are killing my feet. Then I will put on a pair of trousers and maybe, maybe I will go out to drink something. And look for company, you should join me"

"No. You are coming with me and together we are going to look after Annie, just as I said".

He took her arm and dragged her around, they stopped sometimes to chat with people when Finnick was asked about his parents. He always told the same thing over and over again 'they are fine, and they welcomed you'. Finnick couldn't tell when he last saw his parents for more than just a couple of minutes, let alone what they were doing or whom they would have greeted. So he lied, it didn't matter anyway: this people would have forgotten about it in approximately five minutes. He could have told them all that his parents were planning to live on Mars and they wouldn't have given the slightest attention to it.

This is how Panem's upper class was: frivolous, superficial and selfish. Events like this were nothing more than just a chance to tell each other the latest gossips, to talk about the worst dresses that had been worn and the worst hairstyles. Nothing more, nothing less.

Annie found herself trapped in a conversation with Plutarch Heavensbee, Panem's deputy major. She wasn't really listening to him, what he said was unimportant as this entire after party. She would have done anything, even sell her soul, to have the chance to go home and skip this part but it was impossible: she was the artist who opened the evening, the one everyone was betting on. She was forced to stay there, and answer to all the questions they would have made her. Those were the rules, they made it pretty clear when they offered her the job. It wasn't the situation itself that scared her, it was the things that they might have asked her, things that should have remained unsaid. She exercised herself in front of the mirror for the entire week and she had long conversations on the phone with her sister in which her sister made her the most probable answers and she tried to answer without giving ideas that would have led to questions about her past. Until now there hadn't been any problems, they asked her about her dress, if she liked the 'Proms' to which she answered

"Yes, they were always inspiring, ever since I was a little kid"

"Brilliant, Mrs. Cresta may I introduce her to my assistant Fulvia?"

"Enchanted to meet her. Wonderful party isn't it?"

"Yes, even better than the last year" replied Fulvia while sipping her champagne. And there they begun to talk again about dresses and hair and broken marriages. Annie never found herself with such gossips before, but it was fine for her at least they didn't talk about her.

"And you said that your dress was made by?"

"Cinna, he just recently opened a fashion boutique" and the prices weren't exaggerate, but she didn't say that out loud. Not that the money was a problem, not really, they paid her performances quite well, but she preferred invest it in something more than a dress.

"Well, I have to pass by him and pay the compliments. You look stunning darling, like a mermaid" said Fulvia looking at Annie's dress. It was emerald-green, glittering and was adherent till her waist and then opened in a large gown. Annie wondered if this people had actually an idea of how a mermaid looked like in pictures. Mermaids had tails so the only way the comparison worked was if she was wearing a dress that was adherent on her legs too.

"It matches her eyes, don't you think Fulvia"

Finnick's heart stopped for a moment and he felt the corner of his mouth rising to form a smile when he looked at Annie: it always happened in the last months. He just accepted it with resignation.

"And it evidences her complexion. Her skin seems to glow" he said from behind her.

Annie turned around and saw Finnick Odair standing behind her, a brunette with red strains in her hair standing beside him. Now her evening was definitely ruined. What was he doing here? Ok, the answer was simple: he was there for her. But why? Hadn't he nothing better to do than coming here? There was an awkward silence for a moment but Plutarch interrupted it.

"Finnick Odair, what a pleasure. How are Evelyn and Dylan?"

"Fine sir. They returned to Ireland for some weeks, looking for a place where they can invest their money in"

"That's wonderful, I will phone them as soon as they come back. How are your studies going on? And the swimming?"

"They are good, I've got a match soon"

"We all will be rooting for you"

Johanna wanted to scream, this whole thing seemed not to stop. Plutarch even started an auto praise for his government. She looked at Finnick, and that was something really amusing and entertaining. He was looking at Annie with such a fondness and fascination that he reached the ridicule, she gave him a nudge in the side trying to make him stop, making a fool of himself. If he would have opened his mouth flies would have come in.

She wondered about Finnick's transformation. She had known him since forever and never saw him like this, he was a guy who had loads of one night stands, geez Finnick slept around like a lot and never with the same girl twice, but now when it came down to Annie Cresta he was acting like a complete idiot. He never behaved himself like this with a girl before, and she could tell since she had known him for great part of her life.

"I'll leave you to the presence of this charming young lady"

At last, Plutarch went away.

"Finnick, maybe some introductions?"

"Sure. Jo Annie Cresta, Annie Cresta Johanna Mason"

Johanna stretched her hand out "It's a pleasure. Trust me I know already so many things about you, you have become the only subject in Finnick's conversations. He talks about you the whole day" she said as revenge for this entire situation.

Yes, sure only about her. It was Finnick Odair they were talking about.

"I don't think so, But it's nice to meet you" answered Annie shyly.

"Tell me, is Beethoven your favorite composer?" asked Finnick eagerly.

"No. It's Ludovico Einaudi, and now if you will excuse me but I have to go"

Finnick really couldn't understand why she didn't even wanted to start a conversation with him. It's Johanna's laughter to bring him back to the present moment.

"This is hilarious" she said after catching her breath "she really doesn't give a shit about you, does she? She may become my new best friend"

"Shut up Mason"

"No, I'm going to torment you with this for the rest of my life. The Odair charm not working, it isn't something you witness everyday!"


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's note: **Please let me know what you think about the story. You can go on my tumblr (crystabelshalott) for previews and pictures related to the story.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 3:

Annie woke up early on Saturday morning, her throat was dry and she felt an urgent need to turn on the PC and read the reviews about her performance yesterday. It's a fight with herself when she passed in front of her laptop as she walked to the bathroom, but she had the whole day to do it. No need to make it a priority. Besides they paid her so many compliments the evening before that there couldn't have been any doubt about how the evening went.

No, she had to observe her routine.

_Routine. _She established it years ago. They told her it was important to try to shut her mind off. Take some times for herself, do something she liked. Just relax. And she followed the advice. At first she would go out for an afternoon with her sister: a film, some shopping. But when she moved to Panem, she had to find something new. It took her some time, but there was no urgency since her concerts had become less frequent and only now she begun to accept jobs again. So the first thing she did after moving had been wandering about to find a nice little place all for herself. And she found it.

The 'Mellark's bakery' had been exactly what she was looking for. Not far from her home, it was a quiet place and the food was sublime. At first it was only a bakery but a couple of years ago they enlarged it, and now one could sit down and drink something too. And one had not to forget that it was here that she met her very first friend: Peeta Mellark. He was nice and he attended courses at her same university, and it always made her smile when he told her how things between him and Katniss were going. Katniss was Peeta's love interest and he claimed that he had been in love with her since forever, but only lately they had become friends and from what she was told things were going great between them.

It was a beautiful morning of the end of May: the air was warm and all the flowers and green leaves made the scenario in front of her eyes even more pleasant. Of all months may was her favorite. Of all seasons, she had to choose spring: rebirth. New beginnings, which were something she firmly believed in. She wanted a new beginning for herself, that was the reason she moved to Panem and until now she was doing fine. She was recovering and felt at ease: there was nothing to worry about.

Annie felt relieved to find out that it was Peeta's turn at the checkout, she always feared it would be his mother. Mrs. Mellark tended to rant about all the faults in her family members, especially Peeta and it was something that made Annie feel uncomfortable. Because Peeta was her friend and a wonderful person so she never knew how to answer. But even worse was when Peeta and his mother where both in the back of the bakery and the screams of the latter were far too audible. She insulted Peeta in every way possible, calling him useless, weak and ungrateful. But it was not only this that made her feel uncomfortable: people who screamed had that kind of effect on her. She wanted to disappear whenever someone raised his voice, it could have been two strangers but the effect was the same. It brought back painful memories - when she was the one who was screamed at - and she always feared that she would hear the wrong words and a trigger would have been pulled.

"Annie! Nice to see you!" said Peeta with a huge smile on his face.

"Hi, why are you so happy this morning?"

"I had a date with Katniss yesterday"

"She finally said yes?" asked Annie bewildered.

"Yes. I waited for this moment for half my life time and finally it became true"

"But you were friends before" she remembered him mentioning it once.

"Yeah but she knew I liked her. Now she has given me a chance!"

"That's fantastic, what did you do?"

"Well... we had dinner, watched your performance at the Proms and talked. Talking with her is the easiest thing in the world. By the way: you were extraordinary yesterday. How was the after party?"

"Boring. And all the people I met managed to get on my nerves. Oh and I made a theory!"

"I'm all ears"

"People give exotic names to food just to make it buy, and it gets bought because everyone wants to show off not because it's tasty. I tried one thing that was so slimy I refused to try the rest"

She still felt the awful taste in her mouth, that disgusting mix of flavors. She crinkled her nose and Peeta started to laugh.

"So you are here because you decided to eat some real food?"

"Yes. And as you know it's my routine"

"Well, tell me what you want and your dreams will be realized"

"Let me think... I would say a chocolate muffin and a glass of apple juice. A small muffin please"

"Annie they are all the same size ish."

"Ah yes, well try to give me a small one"

"Are you all right?"

Peeta was concerned about Annie's statement. He worried about her, ever since he saw her eat. She ate very small morsels of food and very slowly. There was something wrong in that but he didn't want to sound intruding, he just tried to eat at her same speed so that at least she would spent more time at the table eating not feeling obliged to stop when he finished. Annie never told him anything precisely, but he knew that something happened to her before she moved. He tried to put her at ease, showing her that she could have talked to him in case she wanted to. Just like she listened to him. But it hadn't to be him, she just had to talk about her problems with someone before she was overwhelmed by them.

"Yes, thanks. Don't worry"

"After effects of your performance?"

"Yes, in a way. But seriously don't worry"

They were interrupted by the door bell.

"I'll leave you to your clients. I'm going to sit outside, I'll say bye before I go"

"See you"

Annie walked outside, balancing her breakfast in her hands careful not to make anything fall down. She was surprised to see Finnick Odair sitting outside too. He sat at a table reading. He was wearing a pair of old jeans and a checkered shirt, his bronze hair is in a mess as usual and to her surprise he wore reading glasses. She rolled her eyes and begun to think whether to pass by, hoping he would not notice her or stop and ask sorry for how she behaved the night before. She may not liked him, but it wasn't a sufficient reason to be rude. And she didn't like him because he was complicated. He sometimes acted like he was two different persons, and he was far too conscious about himself. The last reason was acceptable but who was she to judge complicated people. Wasn't she a living contradiction? Hadn't she so many scars that sometimes she felt like a walking mine? She saw herself like that, and it was exactly for this reason that she felt like she should excuse herself with him.

She placed her breakfast on the table in front of him and stood there, but he was to immersed in his book to pay attention. She liked it: when people were immersed in a book, when they showed real interest in what they were reading about. She never thought that the Finnick Odair was one of those people, especially since he was reading 'Richard II' by Shakespeare.

Finnick Odair reading classics, it seemed strange.

Annie sat down and looked at him.

"Let us talk of worms, graves and epitaphs/ make dust our paper and with rainy eyes/ write sorrow on the bosom of the earth/ let us chose executors and talk of wills" she recited.

Annie's voice, now that was something he would have never imagined to hear. Not addressed to him at least.

"You know Shakespeare by heart?"

"Something, yes"

Silence fell between them again. Finnick wanted to be sure why she was there with him, since she usually ignored him.

"What are you doing here Annie?"

"I wanted to say sorry for how I acted yesterday. I was rude and I'm sorry for it"

"Why the change of mind, I mean you could have said nothing and I would have never known"

"I can't tell you, it would involve things that are better left unsaid. Anyway, I made my excuses now I'll go"

"Wait. Do you want to join me for breakfast?"

"No. I'm sorry"

She would have liked to sit down there, talk to him and tell him that the main reason why she distanced herself from him was herself. But she didn't, instead she walked inside leaving Finnick alone outside and feeling sorry for it.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's note: **Please let me know if you liked the chapters. Thanks for all the reviews. Enjoy!

**Disclaimer: **I don't own 'The hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 4:

It was Monday morning, and it was raining cats and dogs. It seemed autumn, late September maybe, not the end of May. Annie Cresta hated rainy days with all her heart, there was something depressing in them, and she hated them even more when she was outside the house. For some strange rules of the universe she always managed to get wet: she could have walked outside with a beach umbrella to cover herself and still got home soaked wet. The umbrella, she despised carrying one around, she never knew what to do with them once they were wet and she was inside a building: where to leave it was one of her biggest problems.

But it wasn't only the weather that made this day awful: she was in a hurry. She had a piano lesson with one of the kids she taught, and her parents would have passed by later in the afternoon to give her the family dog to keep while they were abroad. It was already late when her last lesson finished so she lost the bus and there weren't any others for the next thirty minutes.

She looked at the clock on her phone: 2.25 PM. She had exactly half an hour, during which she had to reach home, finish tidying the living room, put something dry on and take out the new music sheets for Rue, the girl she was giving lessons to. Lessons would quit at four and she would have had nearly an entire hour for herself before her parents came with Odette, her sister, and Pickwick the two year old Scottish Collie she was going to babysit for the next two weeks. talking of dogs she should have also laid down the old carpet on which she would have placed Pickwick dog's bed.

No way she could do all of this in time if she didn't arrive home anytime soon.

Not that her house was far away from the university, it was a fifteen minutes walk if one walked with an accelerated pace, and it wasn't really a burden to go on foot. Where it not for the terrible weather and the exaggerate amount of things she still had to do. In a rainy day the last thing she wanted to do was walk home, but there was nothing to be done. Except making herself on her way.

Why did this things always happened in the most inappropriate moments? Couldn't it just happen in a normal sunny day? Why did it happen to her?

Annie sighed as she opened her umbrella and made her way to the gate.

Johanna and Finnick were standing under the porch, they had a two hours gap before the next lesson and took the chance to take a little fresh air. The last two hours had been hell: the classroom was far too packed and they didn't manage to find a place to sit down so they sat on the floor. Now they had the chance to stretch their legs and breathe clean air. They saw Annie walk by, a yellow spot in the bleak surrounding.

"Oh look, it's Annie" said Finnick.

"Don't start it. You were doing fine today, you talked about her only... let me see" Johanna paused a moment, counting on her fingers "a hundred times ish I would say. But don't worry you are doing more than fine! Remember the way to recovery is long but if you continue this way you'll pass over it in let's say ten years?"

"I'll never pass over it Jo, that's the problem. I mean, I tried but there is nothing to do"

"Finnick, serious now if you are going to talk again of Annie Cresta I'll walk away"

Finnick didn't believe Johanna as she said she would just walk away. Yes, he was aware that he was boring when he talked of Annie but he knew that Johanna was laughing inside whenever he opened his mouth. She couldn't resist the temptation to make fun of his situation. How did she call it? The Odair charm not working.

"You see Jo, it really upsets me that she doesn't even want to talk to me"

"Bye Finn! See you later" said Johanna while getting up.

She really did it. She really walked away.

"Jo wait!" screamed Finnick, but she didn't listen.

Johanna had a better idea, she would have started a conversation with Annie. She had time and although Annie seemed in a hurry she could have walked for a while with her. Now that was something that would have upset Finnick.

"Annie!"

Annie stopped. What now? She was already late. Really, nothing was going as it should have today. She saw a girl running towards her and only as she come closer she recognised her as Johanna Mason. She was the girl with Finnick at the Proms.

"Wait"

"Can we talk while walking. I'm really late" she said a little annoyed.

"Sure. Ok, I never found myself in this position before.."

"If Finnick sent you, the answer is still no. No, I will not go out with him. No, I will not give him a chance. the other day at Mellark's I sat by him only because I wanted to excuse myself for my behaviour at the concert, nothing more, nothing less. I already told him that, and it won't repeat itself"

"I'm not Finnick's messenger. He can talk for himself far to well" Johanna said sharply.

"I didn't mean to be rude"

"Do you always excuse yourself to people Annie?"

"When I'm wrong yes"

"Aren't you strange?"

"Aren't we all?"

"Touché. Do you want to know what I think about the situation between you and Finnick?"

"What?"

"It's fucking hilarious. And annoying because of all the monologues he does about you. But it's hilarious and I make fun of him because you are the first girl who tells him no. Oh and between you and me, it is something good for his ego"

"Well, you resisted him too. I suppose"

"Yes, mainly because I have known him all my life and he is like a brother for me"

Annie was a little envious of people who had known their friends for their entire life. She once had friends like that but...

_Selfish, arrogant, self-centered. _

Johanna looks at Annie who suddenly stopped walking and lost herself in some sort of trance. She was looking at the empty air and it looked as if she was trying to concentrate on something.

"Annie?"

"Sorry. That's a nice thing, I will continue this way" said Annie pointing at her right.

"You know Annie, there are loads of girls after him"

"And they are welcome to it. With my good wishes" replied Annie while walking away.

'Nope, Finnick has no chance whatsoever' whispered Johanna. And now she would have gone back to him and told him.

Annie arrived home at a quarter to three. Soaked wet and exhausted. The only things she wanted to do were playing the piano to calm herself down, take a hot bath, curl up on the sofa in her pajama, watch a movie and then go to bed. But no, she had to give piano lessons and welcome her parents. She loved her parents dearly, but right now the thought of them made her snort. They would have started to make all sorts of questions. Have you eaten, are you sleeping well, are you playing too much... The only thought that cheered her up was that she would have seen her sister again and Pickwick, and that they all had to leave early so they could go back home and finish to pack.

The doorbell rang in the precise moment Annie was finishing to tidy the living room, as she opened the door a twelve-year-old stood in front of her, wrapped in a bright yellow raincoat and a big smile on her face.

"Hello Annie" the girl said.

"Rue! How are you?"

Annie winked at Rue's mother outside and let the girl come in.

"I'm really happy because school is nearly finished"

"You are very lucky then"

"The luckiest!"

Rue followed Annie inside and gave her the coat.

"Have you plaid all the things I told you to play?"

"Yes and I exercised the scales!" said Rue proudly.

"Good, let me hear them and then I found a new song to teach you as reward"

Rue placed herself on the chair and Annie placed a dictionary under her feet so that her feet could touch something hard and were not free to swing around. Rue positioned her fingers on the keys but then looked at Annie.

"I saw you on TV the other day, mom and dad let me stay wake to see you. You looked very pretty and you were really good at playing." she paused a moment "I want to be just like you when I grow up"

Rue's words come unexpected. Not the compliments for the concert, but the part about being just like her.

_Trust me you don't _ thought Annie, but she didn't say anything out loud she just accepted the compliment.

Rue started to play diligently, she was good and put all her concentration and forces in what she was doing. Looking at her Annie thought of herself, she had been younger than Rue when she started. Far more younger but the passion and the interest were the same.


	5. Annie's story (part 1)

**Disclaimer: **I don't own 'The hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 5:

_Annie Cresta's passion for the pianoforte started when she was four years old, and it had been an enchantment at first sight. Something inside her clicked and she just felt so much interest in this musical instrument. The day Annie Cresta saw a piano for real, not just on TV or in a picture, was a such vivid memory in her mind that she remembered it as if it was yesterday. She was out with her parents, looking for a present for her cousin, when they found themselves by chance in the music department of 'The Capitol', the mall in their town. Her parents wanted to go but Annie begged them to stay and take a tour of the shop. That's when she saw it: an old pianoforte, in sale, standing in the middle of a platform. It was a used one and no one had bought it, but it could have been tried out. Annie got nearer fascinated and pressed some keys randomly. As the sound came out she smiled, all happy that it really worked and that she, Annie Cresta, had been able to make it work. _

_After that afternoon the piano became a fixed point in her mind. She wanted to be able to play it, she wanted to learn, she wanted to produce wonderful sounds just by moving her fingers on some keys. So one evening she gathered all her courage, and with a resolution very uncommon for a four-year old child, and announced like an ambassador 'I want to play the piano'. Her parents were surprised by it, they didn't expect this, after all Annie just saw a piano once. How could they be sure that it wasn't just a momentary infatuation? The point was: they couldn't. So they looked at Annie and asked her if she was one hundred percent sure about it. Their daughter just nodded._

_Tom and Abigail Cresta discussed the situation for days. Buying a piano without having the certainty that Annie would have kept interest in it, was a way to lose money. Even buying a second-hand one would have meant throwing away money that could have been used for other things. They wanted to say yes to their daughter but they just couldn't do it. It was too much. So they reached a conclusion: they would have given Annie three months to think about it, if at the end of this period of time she was still interested they would have done this for her._

_Three months exactly after they delivered Annie the news, Annie went to them and said happily 'I still want to play it!'. Tom and Abigail informed themselves about costs for the piano and the courses and found out they could have done it. They phoned all the relatives and asked if they wanted to buy with them the piano since Christmas was near and Annie would have forgotten other presents anyway if there was a piano under the tree to wait for her. So that Christmas Annie cried for joy when she saw a piano in the living room, and that night when she was alone in her bed she promised herself that she would have put all her forces and strength in her new hobby. _

_And she did._

_Three years passed and she still studied hard, always did the exercises she was told to do, even if sometimes she thought them boring. She never needed a reminder that she had to practice, she did it all by herself. _

_Then her little sister was born and Annie stopped for a year and a half, her parents told her that Odette had to sleep a lot and Annie could have played the piano less frequent. She wasn't sad about it, because she always wanted a sister, but the year was hard. Annie was so used to spent at least an hour and a half per day at the piano and all of a sudden she had free time. It was unusual. But this gave her time to stay with her baby sister._

_The following year Annie started lessons again and from that moment on she never stopped. She decided that she wanted to become a pianist and begun to save money, also giving lessons, to pay at least a part of her future studies. At the age of sixteen Annie hold her first concert, followed by a recording of raising stars. She played Chopin. Everyone liked her, the reviews were all positive and Annie made up her mind that she would have become one of the best pianists of all time. _

_She spent even more time at the piano, striving for perfection and this was something that started to worry her parents a lot. It was too much time and it made Annie jumpy, she screamed for frustration whenever she did something wrong and would have played over and over again the same thing until she didn't manage to it. It's not necessary to say that the more Annie tried, the worse it got: she had to relax and try to fix slowly her mistakes, instead she just hit the keys violently. Her parents forbid her to play more than necessary and Annie obeyed._

_A new concert, new reviews: The destructive whirl begun again._

_This time her parents couldn't do anything, she played when they weren't at home. The only person who knew this was Odette but she never said a word, fearing she would lose her sister's affection. The problem wasn't only the piano anymore, that had only been the beginning. _

_Things happened one after the other, and Annie Cresta looked for comfort in music, after all playing the piano always calmed her down, with the only result of making it worse. But she kept saying yes to concerts, and the world kept praising her talent, so it all continued. Until one night Annie sat down on a stage, hands on the piano keys unable to play. She just sat there crying and staring at the audience in front of her. She switched places with another girl and played in the second act: when they asked her what happened, she told she forgot the notes. When her parents wanted to bring her home, she screamed at them to leave her alone, it had been her mistake. Annie told everyone she forgot the notes and the worst part was she auto-convinced herself, she played the second act as if nothing happened and the accident was soon forgotten. _

_Not for her parents, they saw that something was going wrong but Annie didn't want to be helped. She wanted to handle the situation alone._

_And she did. _

_No, she tried: it ended in disaster. _

_But even then she couldn't hate the instrument because it was all her fault, she reckoned that._


	6. Chapter 6

**Author's note: **Please review, it's the only way to know if there are things to change, Or if the story is liked.

**Disclaimer: **I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 6:

Annie walked Rue to the door, the girl promised her to practice just as she told her. Annie always underlined how many times her students had to practice, she wrote it with a pencil on the sheet and told them to cancel the number when they were done. She was protective with her students, she wanted them to play the piano because they loved it not because they were forced to, so she tried to give a low number. If it was too much they would have lost interest, or they would have done it listlessly. Better to do it only a couple of times but in the right way. She tried to encourage her students and to make them decide when they were more ready to go a step forwards. She thought it was important since they were all young: wrong words at the wrong moment could have a bad result. She remembered all the times her teacher told her to play quicker, to pay more attention, that she wasn't good and she tried hard to hold back tears. A part of herself didn't want to make her students feel like that.

"Bye Annie, see you next week!"

"Bye Rue"

"Annie?"

"Yes?"

"Will be your dog here next time?"

"Yes, you can give him a biscuit if you want to" Annie said with a smile.

"Brilliant!"

Annie made sure that Rue jumped in her mother's car and then close the door.

She had an hour all for herself before seeing her parents, not that she could have done many things in this hour: she started with pulling out the old carpet for Pickwick, she put some ice-tea and fruit-juice in the fridge for later and then sat down near by the piano. Soon the first notes of 'Another Love' by Tom Odell filled the air and Annie lost herself in the music. She begun to feel the tiredness fading away and the muscles relax, the world outside disappear and so did her worries: she was alone with her music.

Until the doorbell rang insistently and the atmosphere was ruined.

"Coming!" she screamed with all the air in her lungs as the doorbell rung again for the third time. It could only be her parents, it always seemed like they glued their finger to the doorbell whenever she did not answer the first time. It was not that they were impatient, more too worried that something happened to their daughter and given the previous data it was understandable. They always feared that they entered the house and found Annie lying on the floor, unable to breathe or in a complete and utter mess. It happened before and they were oh-so-scared it could happen again.

Annie opened the door and Pickwick immediately jumped on her.

"Hello chap!" she said, stroking his brown fur.

Pickwick run inside as soon as Annie wasn't the news anymore, there was an entire house to explore.

"Annie!" Odette Cresta hugged her sister tightly "I missed you so much!"

"Odette, I'm not breathing"

"Sorry"

"Hi" said Annie before giving her parents a kiss on the cheek and a quick hug, before letting them all come in. She made them go to the kitchen and let them sit down at the table while she took some glasses and dishes and placed them on the table.

"So I have water, juice and ice tea for you. Is that OK?"

"Perfect, just put everything on the table and sit with us"

"And I've got cake"

Annie put slices on everyone's dish and sat down, feeling far too conscious about the empty plate in front of her.

"Are you not eating?" asked her father worried.

"I already did"

"Annie..." her mother started.

"No you listen. I ate it before with Rue. I can show you the dirty dishes if you don't believe me. And stop doing this! I am twenty one! and I can take care of myself, why don't you understand this?" Annie cried out.

Her mother doubting her words made her more than angry, they never believed her. They were always there worrying for her, and it was annoying. She was aware that what she did once was reason enough to stop trusting her, that what happened was reason enough to worry about her for the rest of their lives, but at the same time Annie wanted more freedom. She wanted to sit at a table with her family and not hear constantly about what or how much she ate. She wanted to have normal conversations with her parents, conversations that didn't include the words: food, sleep, anxiety and crying.

She wanted to be the girl she used to be, she wanted to free her parents from the persistent thought that something could happen to their daughter.

"You know what we decided? We will sent you postcards from every place we visit, you can truck us down!" Odette interrupted the uncomfortable silence before other things could have come out, things that were better left unsaid.

"That's nice. Thanks." she paused a moment "I'm sorry, really I am. It's been a bad day and I am tired, I didn't mean to shout at you"

"We just worry about you darling. We are aware that we may sound oppressive but you gave us such a fright last time, it's impossible not to" said Tom Cresta calmly.

Annie felt tears coming down from her eyes, in moments like this she felt like the biggest disappointment in the world. Like the biggest failure that ever existed.

"Annie, shh don't cry. You are a wonderful daughter, don't blame yourself. We worry about Odette too"

"Yeah, you should hear all the recommendations they give me every morning before I exit the house. Odette this, Odette that"

Annie smiled and wiped away her tears.

"We saw you on TV at the Proms, you were splendid sister! How was it? How was the party?"

"The experience was amazing and maybe I am the pianist for next year too. The party was horrid. No wait I am proud to say that I know everyone's affairs. I could start a gossip magazine with all the information they gave me. Though nothing about me came out and that was positive"

"Did you meet someone nice?"

"No, Odette the average age was forty-five! Urgh"

"You never know"

Everyone laughed. The atmosphere was definitely more lightly than earlier, everyone was more at ease and they all started to make small talk, leaving all the problems and anxieties behind even if for just a moment.

"Have you brought everything Pickwick needs?"

"Yes, it's in the car. The same as usual with him, no wait you have to give him the medicine next week"

"Perfect, I'll just write it down on the calendar. The rest is still the same?"

"It is, and I'm afraid we really have to go now. It was a nice afternoon Annie"

"It was" she wasn't lying, she enjoyed herself. Well, apart from the crying and screaming, which in comparison with the rest had occupied a minimum amount of time.

"Pickwick!" she called, and the dog arrived wagging "Let's say goodbye"

She accompanied her family at the door and helped them bring inside Pickwick's things, then waved them goodbye. Then she put everything at it's place, putting Pickwick's dog's bed near her sofa.

"It's just as two now, for the next couple of weeks. Are you happy?" She said while sitting near the dog and holding him close. Pickwick looked at her with big sad eyes but didn't cry out loud, at least Annie was there.

"Don't worry, we are going to take care of each other and this weeks will fly away. You won't even notice that they were gone. Now come I'm going to give you dinner"


	7. Chapter 7

**Author's note: **Please review.

**Warning:** Mentioning of eating disorders.

**Disclaimer: **I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 7:

Annie was standing alone outside the cinema. She was alone because until now she only had one friend, Peeta Mellark, but he was busy that evening. Not that she couldn't have asked some of the girls that followed her classes and with whom she spent time at university, but Annie was afraid that they might have seen her true self and walked away. What would have they thought if they saw all of Annie's issues come out at once? They would have just called her 'crazy' or 'awkward'. No, better to go alone. Who cared about the cashiers' comments anyway? It wouldn't have been the first time, nor the last one, that she answered 'no' to the question 'are you waiting for someone?'.

And it was better that the cashiers thought her weird than the girls finding out about her past.

So there she stood alone on a sunny afternoon, in front of Panem's cinema when she suddenly saw Johanna Mason walking towards her. Annie liked Johanna, sometimes they saw each other in between lessons or took the same bus to go home. She was a nice person if someone managed to get over her armor of stubbornness and sarcasm, and Annie liked the fact that Johanna always spoke out what was passing in her mind.

"Johanna!"

"Annie! How are you?"

"Fine, it's nice to see you out and about. Why are you here all alone?"

"No one wanted to join me, but I could ask the same thing of you"

Annie shrugged, not really wanting to give an explanation. She hoped Johanna would assume she was alone for the same reason as she, and let the matter drop.

"Let's just go together, so we won't look like two imbeciles"

Little did Johanna know that Annie was more than used to it to do things on her own, one of this was going to the cinema. She didn't care, the only difference from going with friends was that it was less fun. But then again better to go on her own that with friend she no longer related too, with friend that hated her and that she hated, and with whom she no longer felt at ease.

Johanna looked at Annie, once more she seemed lost in her thoughts. It happened often, Johanna noticed. It was like something was said and Annie isolated herself, froze for a moment and looked in front of her with a blank stare. She was bewildered of it: there was something secret in Annie Cresta. No, not secret: Annie hid something and that something took her attention entirely. Johanna was astonished because it tended to happen a lot, often in the middle of normal conversations, and when someone looked at Annie Cresta he wouldn't have thought it possible: she always looked so controlled and at ease. Johanna also felt a bit sorry, because often were her words that made Annie disappear.

"Annie?"

"Sorry, I got carried away" Annie replied with a smile "What were you saying?"

"Do you want to eat a bite after the film?"

"I don't know" murmured Annie.

The reasons for her reticence were two: the first one being Pickwick alone in her house, she had to take him out and get back before the dog's dinner time. But it was only three o'clock, the film was an hour and a half long so the timing wasn't really a problem. The real deal was eating in front of Johanna: she would have seen the way she ate, and part of her problems would have become manifest. Annie didn't want them to be: she just got to know Johanna and she didn't want to be judged.

"It won't take much time, just a bite"

There it was again, Annie deep concentrated in something.

_Yes. No. Yes. No._

"Yes, fine. I'll come, but I have to be home soon: I have to walk the dog"

"No problem"

The film was boring, it was meant to be an adventure movie but nothing really happened. It had only been a waste of time. Everyone talked about it nicely but it just wasn't: the casting was wrong and the acting poorly delivered as was the story. But it ended early so Annie decided to join Johanna for an afternoon snack. She would have tried to not let her manias show off to obviously and maybe Johanna wouldn't have noticed.

The café was a nice one, not too crowded and the food was prime. Annie ordered a slice of apple pie and ordered a tea. Johanna ate a chocolate muffin and drank coffee, as she ate she could not notice that Annie played with her food, she broke her cake in tiny little pieces and it looked like she forced herself to eat it. For Annie an inner struggle was going on, she tried so hard to hide the fact that she couldn't eat like a normal person, that the complete opposite went on. Her mind was working crazy, she wondered how she could just sit there, why she was even there since she was such a disaster and half crazy. Why should Johanna enjoy her company? How could people like her? Like Finnick who said he liked her but in fact didn't know anything of her. She wasn't the girl he thought: she was a mess and always on the point of breakdown. There were days when memories overwhelmed her with such a violence she couldn't stop crying. Damn, she couldn't even eat like a normal person, she had to force herself to put something in her mouth everyday because otherwise she wouldn't have done it. She had to keep repeating 'You are hungry, you need to eat' every time she had a plate in front of her.

Annie dropped her fork and pushed her plate away, then she looked up at Johanna.

"It's not that I don't like him. Well, I'm indifferent but I don't hate him."

"Are we talking of Finnick here?"

Annie nodded.

"I just can't let him come near me, he doesn't know me. I can't...I"

"Annie, are you all right?"

Johanna begun to worry. Annie started to shiver, there were tears in her eyes and all the color disappeared from her face.

Annie could feel it, the morsel that stretched her stomach that preannounced one of her crises.

_Not now, please not now and here._ But nothing to do: her breathing accelerated and she begun to gasp for air. And so all her attempts, all her hopes to result normal vanished in a couple of seconds. The tears begun to come down, watering her cheeks.

Johanna panicked: she didn't know how to act or what to do when she was near people crying. But it wasn't just the tears, Annie looked like a fish out of water who squirmed and looked for water. What could she do to help? Possibly without making it any worse?

She stood up and took Annie's arm.

"Come, I'll help you"

They reached the bathroom in time before Annie crashed on the floor, holding her knees and lowering her head. She sat in that position for a couple of minutes until she managed to calm herself down.

"I'm a good listener if you want to talk about it" Johanna's voice reached her.

Talk about it? She wasn't sure. She never ever talked about this, it was better to forget and go on as nothing ever happened. She had to hide it all or people would have started to think her crazy, but she owed Johanna an explanation. She dragged her in this situation and it could have been the least that she could do. Besides she didn't have to tell her everything, just the basis.

"I had a breakdown, a couple of years ago" she started with some hesitance "At the beginning it was nothing to worry about, so I didn't say anything. I thought I could manage. Then one day I reached the point of no return, I stepped over the line and from that moment on it was a slip into the abyss. I was and still am a piano soloist, that you know. I trained hard but it was never enough: I felt the urge to become better, so I trained even harder. I spent hours and hours at the piano, the rest was unimportant: the thought of not being good enough was reason enough to keep me practicing, and it was the reason why I stood awake at night, why I begun to eat irregularly. In the mean while other things occurred, things that added to this made everything get out of hand. One night I had a concert and I couldn't play, I just sat there crying. They replaced me and I played in the next act as if nothing happened. Here it all degenerated"

Annie's voice was firm but sometimes it came out in a whisper. Johanna waits for more, there had to be more: it didn't explain everything. How could the fact that she had a breakdown be related to her rejections to Finnick? Unless she thought Finnick was after her only for her looks, that once he found out that the façade she showed wasn't the real her, he would have gone. Was it possible that what Annie just told her was just the edge of the story? It certainly looked like that: like there was an immense chasm in front of Annie and she was ready to fall into it.

"Annie, if you don't want to tell me everything it's fine, but if one day you want to talk to me I'm ready to listen to you. I am your friend, and friends help each other out"

"I'm your friend?" Annie asked bewildered.

What have they done to this girl? What happened to her to make her doubt the fact that she could have had friends?

"Yes, you are my friend"

And in the moment Johanna pronounced this words, she promised herself that if one day Finnick managed to get Annie's attention and affection and turned her down and she fell in that chasm because of him, she would have killed him with her own hands. Finnick was like a brother to her but if he fucked things up she wouldn't have had mercy: no one deserved to feel like Annie did. Johanna didn't know the entire story but no one could doubt, looking at Annie curled up on the floor, that she was overwhelmed with problems and her hesitance in eating and her breakdown were only the top of it.


	8. Chapter 8

**Disclaimer:** I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 8:

Finnick and Johanna were sitting on the Odair's front porch with books, notebooks and calculators placed in front of them. They were studying for their final exams together, and today it was the turn of advanced chemistry. Ever since they were kids they learned together helping each other out with the most difficult exercises, and when they discovered that they were going to study the same thing at university they decided to keep on studying together. They had been there for hours now and were both tired, but the exams were in a couple of days and they still hadn't finish to revision great part of the program.

Johanna finished to balance the equation in front of her, checked the result and then dropped the pen and looked at Finnick. There was something she had to tell him, something important, a warning to say so. She had been thinking about it for days now, not really knowing when the perfect moment was, but now she didn't care anymore if the timing was wrong, the only important thing was that he knew that she would have hurt him, if he hurt Annie. Randomly during the day images of Annie curled up on the bathroom floor appeared to her mind, and sometimes it happened when she was with Finnick. Because Finnick claimed to be interested in Annie and that he liked her, and Johanna was sure about the fact that he had a crush on her. But she knew how Finnick was: he was afraid of emotions. No girl ever complained about Finnick not calling or losing interest after he had sex with her, but Annie wasn't like the normal girls. She didn't seem like a person who had one night stands or sex with the first boy who showed up. Johanna didn't want her to get hurt by Finnick. And she would have taken Annie's part if something like this should have occurred in the future, no doubts on that. She loved Finnick like a brother but with all the things Annie had already witnessed, a lost of interest by Finnick was not to be added to the pile. Maybe she was overprotective but she didn't care: if someone hurt her friends she raged. That was Johanna Mason in a nutshell: although she didn't demonstrate it, she cared a lot about other people if they were close to her and she would have done anything in her power to protect them. This was true for all her friends, from those she knew since she was a toddler to Annie whom she was just acquainted with recently.

"I went to the cinema with Annie the other day. Well, technically speaking we met by chance. The film wasn't good, still we grabbed a bite later"

In truth she ate and Annie made war to her cake, but Finnick didn't have to know it. There were things she couldn't tell him, it wasn't her right to do so. She wasn't a gossip but even if she was what happened at the café and what Annie told her wasn't something that could be told out loud without permission. It was a private matter and if Annie tried her best to hide it, even if she didn't achieve the result, there must have been valid reasons for her to do so. Who was Johanna to talk about Annie's past? She had to introduce the argument without details, it was Annie's decision to whom to talk to. The only thing Johanna could have done was warning Finnick.

Finnick tried to keep up a straight face at the mentioning of Annie, he didn't even look up from the notebook nor did he give away any reaction. He was sure that if he did Johanna would have just started to make fun of him. Again.

"And how was it?" he asked flatly.

"Nice"

"How is Annie?"

"She is all right" Johanna paused a moment "Finnick?"

"What?" Now he looked up.

"I believe, no I know, that she is more fucked up than everybody thinks she is. We were at the café and..."

How could she talk about what happened without giving away information of what Annie told her?

"What? Jo, what happened at the café?"

Now Finnick begun to worry, where was this conversation going to end?

"I can't tell you. Honestly, I wish I could: it would make everything so much easier"

"Tell me what?"

"What happened and what Annie told me about herself"

Then why bring it up in the first place? What was the use of it? Seriously, sometimes Johanna was the weirdest person on this planet.

"_Jo _what did Annie tell you?" Finnick asked again, this time more insistently.

No, nothing he said could have made her change her mind. Besides the story would have required a background that she didn't have.

"I can't. But I will tell you this: if she decides to give you a chance and your interest disappears as soon as you had sex with her, if you are doing it for fun, forget about it now. If she lets you come near her and you are just messing up with her, don't. If she breaks down completely because of you, I will kill you myself"

Finnick got a little angry hearing Johanna's suppositions. It was true, he didn't have the most florid past. He had a lot of one night stand, but with Annie the situation was entirely different. It might have been that it all started because she was pretty but it became something else soon enough. What he was feeling for her wasn't lust, it was something different. Something that scared at him a lot, because he never felt such emotions before. He didn't want to have sex with Annie, go out for dinner and finish the evening with them naked, he wanted to know her better. Know everything about her: her flaws, her interests, her problems. Just everything. And he wanted to go on a date with her, a real proper date. He would have been happy just by being her friend.

"How could you think that of me? How could you think this is all a joke?" he asked sourly.

"Because I know you, Finnick. You are afraid of feelings and never, never in your entire life you have done a committed relationship. And I know that I am the last person who can criticize you because I am not much better. And I am not criticizing your previous choices I'm just telling you that if you should act like that with Annie, I will rage"

"Why do you take such interest in the matter?" Finnick was astonished.

"Because I like her, she is my friend. Which said from me means a lot. And if you were me and saw what happened you would react the same way. Annie Cresta is a person who was unlucky to be buried under a pile of shit. Finnick, you should have seen the way she looked at me when I told her she was my friend! She was so surprised to hear it and she was afraid, can you imagine that?"

"What have they done to her to make her react like that? I mean, what person is afraid of having friends?"

"That's what I wondered too. She didn't mention someone else but there must have been: a person alone can't mess herself up like that."

One could think himself unworthy and a failure, but being afraid of having friends? And being surprised at it? That doesn't happen by itself. There were for sure people who played a key role in Annie's life and that maybe abandoned her when she had her breakdown. Annie mentioned not hearing from her friends anymore but there must have been something else: those friends probably told her something. And right now Johanna was wondering about what they might have said.

Finnick and Johanna stayed silent for a moment, than an idea came to Finnick's mind.

"We should introduce her to Cashmere and Gloss. Let her become part of our gang, we should all become her friends"

"Are you saying this to have a chance to talk to her?"

"No. If she really is afraid of being befriended with someone, we are the right people. We won't judge her: think about it. We are all so different from each other, name one thing me, you, Cashmere and Gloss have in common"

"I couldn't find one"

"Precisely. Listen Jo we all have been friends for nearly two decades now, we never tried to change ourselves to get along. We are ourselves and it doesn't matter and she could easily fit in. If she had issues about not being comfortable with herself and tries to fit in a standard she doesn't need to. It will be the best solution"

Finnick's explanation made sense, and it might have been a good idea.

"You know Odair, you may be right. I will talk to her and invite her to our next Friday evening routine. Do you think Cash and Gloss will be bothered?"

"I don't think so, they always are happy to meet new people. And I bet everything they will like Annie. Let's try to see what Annie thinks of it"

"I will text her later, though I am afraid some time may pass because she is keeping her parent's dog and I don't think she will leave him alone at home more than necessary"

"It doesn't matter, we will wait"

And maybe this all would have had positive turnouts for Annie.


	9. Chapter 9

**Author's note: **Please let me know what you think of the story. Enjoy!

**Disclaimer: **I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 9:

Finnick's phone emitted a loud beep and the display started to blink. Mags looked at it with a disapproving glance: she hated the fact that Finnick was always glued to his phone. It was a really bad habit, but despite her scolds there was nothing to do. It just came natural to him. The worst thing of all, in Mags' opinion, was that he wasn't talking to his friends, his true friends, either. Always on some social network as if he had to tell everyone of everything he was doing. And they just read attentively commenting it. Those were not his true friends. She knew that her grandson was popular and adored, but he only had three real friends. Friends that knew how he truly was, and those friends were not in the least interested to be informed of what he was doing twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Mags couldn't understand why Finnick had to act like that, why he wanted desperately attention and admiration, those people were not even aware of how he truly was, they were just believing his act.

Why did he have to act in first place? Mags definitely knew the answer to this question. She blamed Finnick's parent, who miserably failed in their task. She stepped in gladly, but Finnick never stopped to try to become the subject of parental love: he thought that if he was popular, if everyone adored him maybe his parents would have too. But nothing helped: not the friends, not the exaggerate amount of girls he brought home and had sex with, not his swimming talents. Evelyn and Dylan Odair just continued with their indifference.

Finnick ignored Mags' scolding look and opened the text message window, it was from Johanna. Which was weird because she never texted him, she lived only a few houses away from his and always walked to him if she had to tell him something. The time didn't matter to her, she would just storm in like a fury and glue herself to the doorbell. Finnick never understood why Johanna didn't use her mobile like every other normal person, but they once asked her and she said she used it but not with her friends. Why should she text someone who lived in the neighborhood if she could just interrupt their lives?

_Annie decided to join us in our routine for the next Friday, her parents will have come back and she won't have the dog home. Told her to come to your house at eight._

He read the message over and over again, to be sure it was actually there and he wasn't inventing it. Could it be true? He would have met Annie Cresta officially, he would have actually talked to her. Like a real conversation. He was excited, no, more than excited: he could have died for happiness. He would have been for ever in Johanna's debt, but it was worth it. Annie Cresta made up her mind to meet Johanna's friends, watch a movie and eat a pizza with them. If someone would have told him this a few weeks ago he would have thought it was a joke. A tasteless one. A bright smile crept on his face and he felt he could explode any moment now for the happiness inside him. Hopefully the evening would have gone in the right way and Annie would have felt at ease with them. She may have not liked him but he was happy that he could have been her friend. That was definitely better than nothing.

"Yes!" he cheered as loud as he could. And in the moment the last letter came out he realized why Johanna did not bring the news in person. She probably was not in the mood to bear what would have followed next: him starting again his ranting about Annie.

Mags looked at her grandson surprised: she never saw him like that in his entire life. There was something new in his facial expression, something she couldn't decipher. And all of this because of a text message? There was surely something behind it.

"What happened?" she asked.

"Nothing important, except that the love of my life has finally decided not to ignore me anymore" he paused a moment and gave mags a sheepish smile "Ok, it might be because she is Johanna's friend but still"

Mags was surprised, she practically raised him and knew that he was afraid of emotions. He never fell in love with a girl. She was aware that Finnick had one night stands, one must have been blind not to notice the amount of girls he brought home and then were never seen again. She didn't say anything to him because he wouldn't have listened anyway. And she wasn't there great part of the time. Finnick was an adult and vaccinated, who could make his own choices, as long as the girls agreed and they took the right precautions. She wasn't really fine with it but there was nothing to do, she just hoped that one day would have come at ease with who he was and stopped.

"The love of your life?" she asked bewildered that he never mentioned her to her before.

"Yes! And one day I'm going to marry her!"

"And I presume that the girl in question hasn't the slightest idea of your plans"

"No, she doesn't. But once she will know me, she won't resist to the Odair charm" joked Finnick.

"Darling, by the way you are cheering one could easily guess that until now your charm hasn't worked at all. Does she even acknowledge your existence?"

"Yes. But she knows I exist. She doesn't care about me though, and it quite hurts."

"I like her"

"Because she doesn't care about me?"

"Yes. It means she has better sense of judgment than most girls, you don't know her and she doesn't know you. Except how you act usually with people and she doesn't like it."

"I don't like it either but I'm trying to change"

"But what if she really isn't interested in you?"

"Then I'll be her friend, I'm OK with that. But I would like to date her"

"So what's the girl's name?"

"Annie Cresta, twenty-one, she studies at the conservatory and is a piano soloist. She opened the Proms this year"

"The Proms you went to?"

She remembered Finnick mentioning something like that to her. But he never talked of a girl, he just said he would have attended the Proms. Which sounded weird because he hated classical music. Now it made sense.

"With Johanna, who tried to kill me for it a couple of times. Back to Annie, she is very pretty and talented and I wish I could know her better. I saw her once and I think I have fallen for her. But it's not right, I mean I know nothing about her do I? And Johanna said something happened to her, that Annie is immersed in problems"

"Finn, if you are going to be friends with her you will know something more about her, and it won't be about her looks only"

"It's not only that" said Finnick defensively. Why was everyone thinking that he was always after pretty faces? Why, just for once, could someone actually agree that he wasn't that shallow? Right, he knew why but this once it was different.

"I know"

Mags' answer surprised him, and he immediately felt sorry for not giving her enough credit. He knew that Mags didn't approve all his choices, that sometimes she was holding herself from scolding him about his conduct and sometimes he feared that she looked at him and saw the facade everyone else saw. That she didn't like him, just as he didn't like himself. He couldn't have bared it: Mags was his only family, the only important person, besides his best friends, in his life. She raised him and had always been there for him, even when he acted like a complete jerk. Mags knew it was difficult for him and always tried to be there for him.

"But at the same time you really know nothing about her. People show a façade it doesn't mean that it represents us"

Mags suspected that Finnick had his own version of Annie Cresta in mind, a version that reflected what the girl showed to the outer world. Everyone hid himself under a mask, because of the things that a person would think uncomfortable. Finnick couldn't really be in love with that girl, have a crush on yes, but not love. Love would have required a deeper knowledge of the other person and Finnick didn't have it. In the end he knew nothing about her except for the things Annie showed to the world and those were never the entire truth. Everyone hid the most uncomfortable thing in fear to get judged, or ignored or something along that way. Wasn't Finnick a living example of it? Then why didn't he realize that the same happened for every other person?

"I think I already know that. Still, she comes over next Friday with Jo, Cash and Gloss. If you want to meet her"

"That's a pity, I won't be here"

"You are going home again?" Finnick's voice broke down at the end. He didn't want Mags to leave him alone, he hated it: be alone in a big house. Having Mags beside him gave him the illusion that the Odair family could sometimes be defined as normal and he loved her so much. She had always been the only person with whom he could open up completely without being judged. If something was wrong he would have talked to Mags. How could it be that his grandmother was his only motherly figure and he didn't know anything about his real mother? At the only thought of Mags leaving he was already sad.

Mags noticed the sadness in Finnick's eyes, she was sorry about it too but, as much as she loved Finnick and loved spending time with him, she couldn't have stayed in Panem forever. "Yes, I have to. Finnick I can't live here"

"Why not?"

"Because I miss my home, my garden and my circle of friends. Darling you are grown up, you have your life now. You don't need me as much as before"

"But it's nicer when you are here with us" Finnick went silent for a moment, thinking about the empty house. There was no us, there was Finnick Odair in the house alone and his parents God knows where "With me" he corrected himself.

"I know. But you can come to me during the holidays, and we will hear from each other. Every day if you want to"

"I'll miss you"

"Don't be too sad" she said and gave him a peck on his cheek.

"I won't. And when you will come again I will let you meet Annie Cresta. So you have to come back as soon as possible! Oh and did you know that I've become Johanna, Cashmere and Gloss' resource of hilarity with this story of me and Annie?"

"I can imagine that pretty well"

"Well sometimes I laugh at myself too. Isn't it funny that I have a crush on the only girl who isn't interested in me?"

"We can't decide this thing Finnick. It just happens"

Finnick nodded.

"She must be a really special girl if you fell for her"

"She is. And I, Finnick Odair, promise you to introduce Annie Cresta to you"

"That's fine" she said while handing him the shopping list "Now go and do the shopping dear, so I have something to cook"


	10. Finnick's story

**Author's note: **I am not convinced about this chapter, please let me know what you thought about it. Enjoy!

**Disclaimer:** I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 10:

_Everything about Finnick Odair's public image was false. He put on an act, showed people what they wanted to see, and behaved as they thought he should. There were two versions of Finnick Odair: everyone's darling and the real one. Those two version were completely incompatible: they had nothing in common. But why did he put on an act in first place? What drove him to hide his true self from everyone? The answer to the first question was to protect himself from judgements, to the second a desperate need to fit in and to be liked by everyone. And the best way to be accepted was hiding the real Finnick under layers and layers of charm, self-confidence and arrogance. Finnick never thought it a great problem, there were four people who knew him and appreciated him for what he truly was but for the rest of the world it didn't work. And four people were not really enough. For him yes, because they were family even though the term didn't relate to the common idea of it, but not to prove his point. And his point was to show that he was loved and adored by the most people possible. He wanted to prove that people could actually like him, that he was worth something.  
_

_Sometimes it happened that Finnick hated himself for what he was. For the lies he told around and for how he acted, but it wasn't such a great deal until the day Annie Cresta looked at him with her big green eyes, that had the same shade of green as spring grass, and told him with a tone of voice in the in-between of annoyed and disgusted what she really thought of him._

_'A flirt. self-centered, arrogant preener. And a peacock who thought far too highly of himself' that had been her exact words. Words that hit Finnick like a cold shower not because he didn't know already, but because for the first time he really cared about it. He didn't want her to think of him like that and for some strange reason, for the first time in years, Finnick Odair felt the urgency to tell the truth about himself. He wanted to explain everything right there, in a crowed corridor in-between classes. He wanted to open up his heart, let the words flaw out in a tortuous stream, but she walked away not giving him the time to tell the truth. And he needed desperately to tell her so that, even if she still disliked him, at least all the cards were put on the table. _

_But tell her what? The entire story behind the façade of Finnick Odair. A story that was known only by those four people who really liked him for what he was: Mags, his grandmother, and his friends Cashmere, Gloss and Johanna._

_Because yes, there was a reason for his behavior._

_Finnick Odair was the only son of Dylan and Evelyn Odair, but before that he was an accident. He was the result of a wild night and the missed thought of using protection, and that was exactly how his parents saw him. He came unwanted in to their marriage, and was a mistake they couldn't have got ridden of. His parents were rich, young and very active in politics and successful in their jobs but they failed miserably in the parenthood task. It was clear from the very beginning that they wouldn't have raised him: in the moment Finnick uttered his first cry they were already going through a list of possible nannies to hire. And at this point Mags, Dylan's mother, stepped in. If Finnick's parents wouldn't raise him she would have, at least she wasn't a stranger and that boy would have had someone of the family taking care of him. And she already loved her grandson so much that it didn't bother her._

_It should be unnecessary to say that it's because of his family situation that Finnick became what he was._

_He didn't know why his parents behaved like that, why they never asked him how he was, why they were never at home. The first time he was invited to Gloss and Cashmere after school he remained surprised how many questions their parents made. How much interest they showed for their children. And this struck Finnick, like a lot. He begun to think that maybe it was his fault, that he wasn't good enough for his parents. So his aim was to get better, be loved by everyone and maybe then his parents would have shown a little interest._

_The years passed. He studied hard, got the best notes, trained hard to be a good swimmer. It still wasn't enough, Mags told him to accept that certain people weren't good at being parents, that he was perfect just as he was, but it didn't help either. He still believed it was his fault, so he decided to look for attention elsewhere. Of course being handsome helped a lot, he became THE Finnick Odair. He was popular and he enjoyed it was all superficial, all those people didn't know him. They didn't care about how he really was, and this was something Finnick appreciated. At least he didn't have to display emotions, which was something he was deeply afraid of. After all he was his parents' son, and they failed miserably when it came down to human emotions. In his whole life he only loved four people and that because they were his family but he believed he was completely incapable to feel something for someone else.  
_

_That was until Annie Cresta entered in the picture. Because when he saw her he felt something and maybe it wasn't love, because one couldn't love a person without knowing anything of that person, but it was something along that way. Fondness, a crush. He liked her, he really did. He couldn't tell why but Annie Cresta was different, first of all because she did not like him. But Finnick felt different when he thought about his feelings for Annie: it was the first time he wanted to know a girl better. He wanted to have a date with her not a one-night stand.  
_

_But Annie didn't like him, so for the first time Finnick felt the urge to change himself. To drop his act and just be himself._

_But who was the real Finnick? He asked himself that question a lot._

_The real Finnick was everything people would have never related to him. He was insecure, he doubted everything about himself, he always feared that one day the people who mattered most would have let him down. He was afraid of letting his grandmother and closest friends down. He was afraid of not being good enough for anything and anyone. But it wasn't only about his personality, it was also about the things he did. He loved staying at home watching a movie or read a book, instead of going out. He didn't like going out at all.  
_

_The list of things that characterized the real him was long and unexpected, and he would have gladly split it all out when Annie turned him down. There were so many things he could have said but he didn't because she didn't give him the time, so he decided he would have proven to her that he was not how she described him. _


	11. Chapter 11

**Author's note: **Thanks to Odestalovebaby and The Honey Crisp for their reviews. Enjoy and please review.

**Disclaimer: **I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 11:

"Pickwick, please. You can't take it with you" said Annie looking at the dog in front of her. Why of all days did he chose this one not to listen to her? Annie had no intention whatsoever to let the dog win the argument. Pickwick was holding his plastic pig in his mouth, and wanted to bring it with them in their daily walk. He hold it tight and looked at Annie as to implore her to say yes, yes he could have brought it too. And Annie would have gladly accepted, were it not for the fact that she did the that mistake a couple of days before, and Pickwick lost the pig on their way and once he realized that his faithful companion wasn't with him anymore, he started crying and going nuts to find it. She had to make the same way backwards, checking every path and green spot before she found it again in a flowerbed. Luckily they found it, otherwise she didn't know what Pickwick could have done. In the moment he saw his pig again the whole world seemed to be at the right place again: he stopped crying, licked it a few times and then took it in his mouth again ready to head for home. But what if the same happened today and she couldn't have located it and it got lost? What then? Pickwick considered that plastic pig like his domestic animal, he cried even if it was outside in the garden and he was inside the house, so what if he would have never seen it again? Annie feared he would have died of a broken heart and she didn't want to take that responsibility. No, it was better to leave it at home. He could have walked around the garden with it later.

"No, you can't bring it with you" she said again and took the pig out of the dog's mouth, putting it on Pickwick's bed. But the result was the dog taking it again. So the situation started another time from the beginning: Pickwick looked at Annie happily and wagged his tail, then he scampered to the door sitting down in front of it and waiting for his mistress to come and take him outside.

Annie sighed loudly, and reached him.

"Fine" she murmured while putting the harness on the dog "But if you lose it, I won't go back looking for it. Not my problem". She was lying of course, she would have spent hours looking for that stupid thing if necessary. She hated when Pickwick cried. She would have just paid more attention this time and, if Pickwick dropped it, she would have putted it in her bag.

Panem had a big park in the center of it. It wasn't too far away from Annie's house and it was the best place to walk a dog: there were different paths and she always tried to take a different one so that it wouldn't have gotten boring for her nor for Pickwick. Different surroundings, different odors. Today she chose the path near the duck's pond, hoping that the dog wouldn't have gotten mad at the sight of ducks. There was also another advantage over this one which was the fact that it was all sheltered by trees and since it was a hot day she would have stayed in the shadow and wouldn't have had to bother of getting a sunstroke or sweat too much. It would have only made the walk uncomfortable. Annie and Pickwick walked slowly, sometimes they stopped so that the dog could sniff around if he wanted, or the children who asked for it could stroke his fur.

Finnick Odair was taking a run around Panem's park, after all the time he had spent on books he needed to move or he would have gone mad. He was nearly finished with his round when he saw a dog walking towards him. Seriously he noticed the dog before he noticed that it was Annie Cresta the person walking it. that was mainly because he adored dog and he often thought of taking one himself if only he had more time to care for it. Finnick literally melted whenever he saw a dog, he just had to stop whatever he was doing and go to it so that he could have petted him. He accelerated his pace and run to Annie and the dog.

"Haven't you a wonderful dog!" he said from a distance a small distance "Can I?" he added as he kneeled down the dog.

"Sure" replied Annie. The voice seemed familiar but she didn't make any connection before she looked down and saw Finnick stroking Pickwick's fur and talking gibberish to him. What to do? She couldn't have just walked away, it would have been rude besides she didn't want to ruin the dog's moment of glory.

"Hi" she said with some hesitance.

"Hello to you!" replied Finnick with a bright smile on his face.

Meeting Annie Cresta made his day. It was stupid but it was the truth, he just couldn't help it. It always made him happy to see her.

_Having a crush __sucks._

Silence fell between them and Annie felt a little uncomfortable with it. She felt uncomfortable with people period, especially with Finnick Odair. It was merely because she didn't know how to act around him, she made clear what she thought about him yet he still tried to make her change her mind.

"He is not my dog but my parents'. And he is called Pickwick, like the"

Pickwick... Dickens... It didn't take much to Finnick to make the connection. He read all of Dickens' novels though he didn't like 'The Pickwick Papers' much.

"The novel, I guess" he finished Annie's sentence,

"Yes"

"Well it's a very original name for a dog. And he is beautiful, just like his babysitter"

Annie blushed and lowered her sight: she didn't know how to react when he talked like that.

"Why is he dragging around a plastic pig?"

"It's not just a plastic pig. It's his plastic pig, and he carries it around because it's his pet and he takes care of it. Seriously he takes it around the house whenever he has eaten." Annie tried to explain the situation without sounding too stupid, because really how many dogs dragged around their toys while they were taking their walk?

"Aren't you a nice little thing?" said Finnick, giving again all his attention to the dog, who was very happy about the interest he was given.

"Finnick?"

"Yes?"

"Do you want to join us for our walk, for a moment. That is if you aren't going in the opposite direction"

Technically he was, but he could have stopped his running round there and head home now. Besides it was Annie Cresta who was asking him, and to that he would have never said no.

"Gladly and don't worry"

They walked in silence for some time until Annie finally found the courage to say what she had to.

"Thanks for the invitation on Friday" she blurted out.

Thanks because it was Johanna who invited her on Friday, but she was pretty sure that the idea started from Finnick. Johanna gave her some hints about it, and she was glad that he did that he suggested her to meet their friends. Because deep down Annie was bored of doing everything alone and she really hoped that she would have fit in, that with them she would have found herself at ease.

"You're welcome, it really is no a big deal. The others, Cashmere and Gloss, are exited to meet you"

"Really I hope I'm not bothering you, since I come in as quite an intruder"

From what Johanna told her she knew that they all knew each other since childhood, and being the new element... well, maybe she wouldn't have fitted. She knew nothing about them, she knew no one of them - except for Johanna. what if they didn't like her?

"Don't worry, it will be fun" he reassured her "Remember at eight"

There was another thing Annie had to say regarding the hour of the appointment and she nearly forgot. She had been called for a meeting, they offered her a job and there was no other day except Friday. It was at half past five and probably she could have done it in time, but she couldn't be sure of it. She had to go home and change herself before going to Finnick's.

"That makes me think: I may be late. I have a meeting and I don't know what time it will be finished"

"A meeting?"

"Yes, they offered me a contract. They planned an album for me, my first. No wait, first and a half. And it will contain songs written by me"

"Congratulations!"

"Well, I still have to write the songs. The alternative is me playing a collection of classics, but they thought I could try the original ones"

"You'll have a huge success, at the Proms everyone adored you"

"We'll see, but let's hope that everything goes as it should. Me and Pickwick will turn this was, it was nice to meet you. See you on Friday!" she said before turning right.

"I'm looking forward to" he replied and waved at her.


	12. Chapter 12

**Author's note: **Please review. Enjoy!

**Disclaimer:** I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 12:

Annie Cresta was waiting outside the Odair's house door. With one hand she was holding the cake she bought for the evening, and the other was placed on the doorbell. Her dilemma was whether to ring or not: a part of her wanted desperately to turn around and never come back, the other part wanted to ring the doorbell. Unfortunately at the moment the irrational side of her was winning, and the temptation to leave was far too inviting. It would have been so easy to turn around and walk away, she could have invented an excuse and text Johanna later. But somehow she imagined that Johanna wouldn't have accepted the lie, and she would have just gone to Annie's house and dragged her with force back to Finnick's. In the end she didn't have to be afraid of anything: it was just a pizza and a movie, and she could have left early if she didn't enjoy herself. Besides it wasn't fair to walk away, considering that they had been kind enough to invite her, and as Johanna put it: they were all eager to make her acquaintance. But why did they want to? She was nothing special and they didn't know her.

There was one thing that was particular important in her momentary indecision, and it was the fact that she had to eat around people. A pizza. Right, she didn't have to eat it all but even for just a quarter of it, she would have needed time. And a quarter was not enough, that wouldn't have passed unnoticed. This whole situation was just oh-so-wrong, it was definitely better to turn around and stop making a fool of herself.

At home she would have been alone and at ease, and this was just too tempting.

"Just ring!" she whispered to herself and pressed the button, before having the time to change her mind again.

Finally she arrived. It wasn't really that late, but Finnick feared that Annie had changed her mind. Because well, there was him and because of what Johanna told him. But no as he opened the door, it was really Annie Cresta standing in front of him. And he felt the usual fondness rising in his chest and he couldn't help but grinning at her.

"Hi!" he simply said.

"Hi"

Annie looked at Finnick, he was staring at her and gave no sign of moving. She was quite worried about it, it wasn't exactly as she imagined it especially because he wasn't letting her come in. She started to think about what to say, when she heard Johanna screaming from the inside.

"Finnick! Are you both alive? Or were you kidnapped by aliens? Don't scare her off!"

Finnick shook his head slightly and freed the door so that Annie could have come in.

"Sorry, how are you?"

"I'm fine, I brought a cake. Since I stormed in ruining your routine" she said while handing him the cake.

Despite Finnick and Johanna's reassurances she still saw herself as an intruder in the picture, so she decided to buy a cake at Mellark's as a way to make amends. Besides it didn't seem nice to her to be invited to dinner and not bring anything with her.

"You're not ruining anything, now come and meet the others!" Finnick said all happy "They are all looking forward to meet you!"

She followed him in the living room and looked herself around. There was Johanna who welcomed her with a 'Hello crazy. We thought you would change your mind', and a boy and a girl who resembled each other very much.

"Cashmere, Gloss this is Annie. Annie, Cashmere and Gloss. Annie brought cake!"

As the presentations were made, Annie looked at Gloss and she asked bewildered "Is your name really Gloss? I don't want to be rude"

But seriously, who would ever name his son Gloss?

Gloss started to laugh. "Don't worry. It's Richard actually"

"Richard?"

How was it that from Richard the nickname had become Gloss?

"Yes, it's actually Cashmere's fault. She has always acted a little posh, and when we were little she spent many times a day saying that I was gross. I didn't fit in her standards, but one day she said 'ugh, you are gross' only that r came out as l and so the nickname was invented"

"I'm not posh!" screamed Cashmere.

"Cash you are and always have been. And you are obsessed with manners and gross is your favorite word. You say it constantly. 'Finnick don't do that, it's gross' 'not in a million years, it's gross'."

"It's not true"

"No, it's not true: it's gross" joked Johanna.

Cashmere begun to mumble idiots and then pouted.

"But don't worry we like you anyway"

Annie felt like a fish out of water for a moment, they all knew each other so well that she was wondering what on earth was she doing here. She felt slightly uncomfortable but now she was there so she might as well try to enjoy herself.

"Have you known each other since when?" she asked hesitantly. It must have been an awful amount of time if they acted this way. So natural, not holding back what they really thought. And yet she was surprised because at first sight it seemed that they didn't have anything in common, so how could it be that they got along so well?

"Kindergarten. We were a group of annoying brats, we were the cause of desperation and still are" said Gloss simply.

Annie's memory begun to wander about what happened with her childhood connections, not really wanting to think about it but it came natural. Sometimes it happened that memories came back without her wanting them to. It's like there was a connection between all things that would create a chain reaction in her mind, a chain reaction that, when the last tassel fall down, would have caused her losing herself in memories. And sometimes it ended in tears.

Johanna saw Annie's facial expression, with the corner of the eye but she saw it. And no way she would have let repeat what happened at the café.

"Let's have dinner!" she said out loud changing topic of conversation.

Dinner, that was something that wouldn't have brought her to tears. Except maybe the thought that she had to eat a pizza in front of four people, and that would have required an enormous amount of time: she would have forced them to stay at table for more than necessary. She could feel her hands begin to sweat at the only thought of it. _You can do this _she thought and followed the others to the kitchen. They all sat down around the table, dishes were given and everyone begun to eat. She took small morsels at time, but was happy to notice that Cashmere was eating with a fork and a knife, she was the first person - that Annie knew - to do that, and it came quite as a relief because there was a small chance that Cashmere would have eaten really slowly, if she had to cut every single piece.

"So tell us what do you do?"

"I'm a pianist, I study at the conservatory"

"Wait you are the one who opened the Proms this year? The Proms Finnick attend?"

Annie nodded.

Not this again, thought Finnick. Now it wasn't only Johanna but also Cashmere and Gloss would have started to make fun of him too. He couldn't have bear it.

"Thank God I was busy that evening! No offense Annie, but Finnick can be quite boring when he rants about you" said Cashmere.

"Please Cash, could you stop?"

"No, I want slip away the chance to make fun of you. Just kidding, how long have you been playing? It must be really a long time if you opened such a famous occasion"

"Since I was four. What do you and Gloss do?"

"I study languages. Which makes me think, your surname is Cresta, Any chance of Italian relations?"

"My father's family. I can't talk Italian much, but I understand it "

"I'm a trainer in the arena" said Gloss. The arena was Panem's gym.

"Any chance that if I pass one day you can give me information about the pool hours?"

Since she first moved to Panem she wanted to start swimming, it had always been an occupation she enjoyed much. And it would have been another way to pass time and to occupy her mind with things that were not the piano.

"Sure, Just pass and you will be given every information you want"

They chatted for the whole dinner and Annie often took part of the conversations without hesitance. She never felt so much at ease with other people, people she never met before and yet everything was going in the right way. All her reticence towards the idea had vanished in matter of minutes: it was true it had been awkward at first but now she didn't feel excluded or out of place. To the contrary there wasn't another place she would have liked to spent her evening.

"So what film are we going to watch?" she asked at the end of dinner.

"We have a list and we vote which one. We do so every two weeks" explained Gloss.

"What is your favorite movie?" asked Finnick.

"Well there are many. I like everything with Aneurin Barnard and then there is 'The Golden Compass'. But if I should chose one I would definitely say 'The Adventurer: the curse of the Midas Box' with the mentioned Aneurin Barnard"

"We should add it to the list!" screamed Cashmere "What's it about?"

"It's an adventure story about this boy Mariah who is hired to find out... I can't explain it, it's complicated. You have to watch the trailer"

"We will, We will and next time we will watch this film with the actor you like best!"

...

It happened before that Annie Cresta stood in a room full of people and felt like the loneliest person in the world. That she would just go out with her friends and detach herself entirely from what they were saying. But not this time. This time she felt at the right place, with the right people.


	13. Chapter 13

**Disclaimer: **I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 13:

On Saturday morning Annie decided to write a quick mail to her family. She made up her mind to write to them about the evening that just passed. It would have made them happy, and maybe they would have stopped worrying about her for some time. She made a cup of tea, and sat down at her desk looking at the white screen in front of her. She stood still for a moment, but then she found the right words to type.

_Hello there!_

_How are you all? Have you all settled back in your usual routines? I know that we have seen each other not a long time ago, but now that I finished my semester and done all my exams I decided to keep in touch a little more than usual. It's my good intention! And I'm sure you don't mind to have more news from me, especially mom and dad, so you won't have to worry about me and what I am or not doing. Anyway, I am writing because I have lots of good news for you all, which will make you do a happy dance. First of all I have new friends, and don't worry it won't end like last time. They are really nice and funny, they always speak their mind and they don't treat me like I am made of glass. There wouldn't even be the time to feel uncomfortable around them, or feel the urgent need to fit in. They are so different from each other and yet they still are friends since childhood... So in this group there are: Johanna, whom I already talked about, Cashmere and Gloss, who are twins, and Finnick. Finnick is quite a complicated person, he acts different when he is around friends and when he is around strangers. But who am I to judge? Anyway, I was invited for a movie and a pizza yesterday, and it's been ages since I enjoyed myself so much! Which leads me to the second big news: I ate nearly an entire pizza all by myself! It took time but no one noticed because Cashmere took even more time (she eats pizza with knife and fork). So yes a hurray for me! Next time they will come to me and we will watch 'The Adventurer'._

_Now that I have told you all the news, that should have calmed you all down on how I am doing, I'll pass to less mundane subjects: I signed the contract they gave to me. Next year, if everything works as it should, my first album will come out. I still can't believe it an album made by me, my songs! I'm so happy about it, and I hope you all are proud of me._

_Now I really have to go._

_I hope I will soon have news from you all. Lots of love!_

_Annie._

She checked the text and then send it. It occurred her only later that maybe she could have chosen the words better, it sounded too much as if she was annoyed with her parents. as if she was making fun of their worries. But now it was too late, was it?

The answer came nearly immediately.

_Hello sister!_

_I really __don't __have much time to talk to you since I, Odette Cresta, am going out on a date. And I still have to get ready for it so I'll be quick, and later I'll write you again and I will give you all the details about my afternoon. We are all fine, and nothing exciting happened to us. Mom and dad constantly say that they miss their holiday, but they have always done that. Really, I bet that as soon as they retire from work they are going to travel around the world and nothing will stop them. And we will be stuck here, with our lives while they will feel young again. But it will be fine: they will stop worrying for us. Still... Annie, how are you? Answer me honestly. It's not that I don't trust you, but I know that these weeks have been a little stressful: you had the contract to sign, the last exams to give. Annie if you don't feel well, if something bothers you tell us. We will always be there for you. Don't shut us out. Why am I telling you this? Because of what you said in your mail, the tone you used to say you ate an entire pizza. I know that mom and dad can be stressful, they are __always __overprotective and want you to eat normally but don't joke about it. Don't use that tone with me. Because when I was little you scared the living daylights out of me. I didn't understand what was happening to you but now I do. That doesn't mean that I stopped being scared of it, of the darkness that once made my __sister disappear. So don't, just don't, because you have no idea how it feels._

_Now back to your friends. I looked for them in the internet when you gave me the names, they seem nice and I'm looking forward to meet them all. Don't worry about the last time, if they make you feel at ease there is nothing to worry about. I saw the photos you all made, you look so happy Annie. And that is a positive thing. But you forgot to mention one thing: Finnick Odair. Like seriously, you didn't tell me he was that handsome! And are you aware that he feels something for you? Great part of his posts are about you. Well he never mentions your name but you are the pianist who opened the proms this year. And the physical descriptions fits more than perfect. And now, I am curious about it all. You have to tell me everything!_

_Wait, Annie what do you think of him? Is there a chance that one day you'll like him too?  
_

_Looking forward to hear from you. Kisses and hugs._

_Odette_

Annie read the mail twice. She was happy for her sister's date, but at the same time she was sad because of the impact that her decisions had on her sister's life. She never knew what her sister thought of the events that occurred in the past. They never discussed it. The Cresta sisters didn't open their hearts to each other, and Annie felt like it was her fault. She should have told Odette the entire truth, made sure that she understood what really happened, but Annie didn't. She didn't because as soon as she got better she just wanted to forget everything.

_I'm sorry, I didn't mean too._

She quickly answered.


	14. Annie's story (part 2)

**Disclaimer: **I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 14:

_It had been an awful afternoon for had been invited by her friends to go to the mall - do some shopping, eat an ice-cream and chatting - but it didn't go exactly as planned: it ended badly. It had been some time that Annie Cresta detached herself from her friends because she couldn't stand them anymore. She stopped paying attention to their dialogues because she had so much to handle with, that talking of shoes, boys and sex wasn't really in her priorities. She was trying to keep her head above water, in a sea made of feelings of unworthiness, a reticence to eat and the impossibility to sleep well. The thought of being a delusion was a fixed point in her mind and whenever she looked at her reflection in a mirror she wanted to cry. She hated what she had become, she hated the lies she told regularly and her self-esteem being less and less every day. She had so many problems, real problems, that listening to frivolous matters was the last thing she wanted to do. But she went to the afternoon she was invited to, because maybe this time things would have gone better. Maybe this time she wouldn't have detached herself from their discussions, maybe she would have enjoyed herself, maybe she would have felt better after having spent time away from the piano, and perhaps she wouldn't have screamed internally at her friends because they were all so stupid. Couldn't they see that there were more important problems than just boys? Couldn't they see her distress as she struggled through life?_

_Full of hope Annie took her car and drove to 'The Capitol'. The appointment was at three at the entrance: she was early and the others were late, and this made her annoyed and upset. She wasn't really obsessed with punctuality, but she wasn't happy to be there in first place, so the thing made her upset. The more the time passed the more her mood got worse. When her friends finally arrived, they welcomed her with their silly high-pitched voices and asked her how she was not really caring for an answer, because as she opened her mouth to speak they started to talk about them. And it bothered Annie, mainly because they kept on saying that they had problems. But they didn't know what having problems meant, did they? They were not feeling unworthy, they didn't stop eating because a morsel blocked their stomach. They knew nothing._

_"You know Annie, he keeps on asking about you"_

_And she couldn't care less._

_ "Really?" she asked not sounding really convinced._

_"Yes. Oh did you know that..."_

_No she didn't and it was not in her interest to find out. It had been an entire hour of gossiping: they had told her everything about their sex lives, about the new shoes or t-shirts they recently bought. And Annie was sick and tired. Sick because she had a headache coming and she felt the urgency to play. She was spending __with these girls__ precious hours she could have used to get better in her performances. And tired because it had been days since she last slept well._

_"Annie? Annie?"_

_"What?"_

_"Are you not listening to us?"_

_"Yes of course!"_

_"Then what were we saying?"_

_"About your new pair of ballerinas?" she tried to guess._

_"No. Annie we didn't want to say this but now we have to. Ever since your musical career started you are not the same person we used to know: you are arrogant and selfish and far to self-centered. You think only of yourself!"_

_This was enough, Annie felt the anger raising inside her. She was not listening? She couldn't even open her mouth that they talked over her._

_"I'm sorry! I'm sorry if I am not feeling well enough to talk about boys, shoes, or clothes!" she screamed._

_"It's not about feeling unwell Annie. You are lying! You just __have __a too high opinion of yourself and cannot stand the thought of not being at the center of things for once. But you know what? You are right, I mean we are not pianists, we didn't have a concert made for us. We have not made a record, but just for once you could have stepped off your pedestal!"_

_Annie felt nauseous and on the edge of tears. Why didn't they understand? Why couldn't they see how she felt? Those were her friends! She knew them since she was a toddler. So what changed? _

_She didn't care. Why bother with it?_

_She couldn't find the words to say and her throat was dry. She just turned around and walked away, there wasn't really anything to say. Tears fell down as she heard her friends shout behind her "Yes, walk away! It's better without you anyway"._

_Annie arrived home at four, her parents weren't back yet and Odette was reading in the living room. As she passed by, she said hello and run to her room, only then she let all the tears come out. She sat down on the floor leaning against the bed as hot tears wet her cheeks. She was overwhelmed with memories: she saw herself on that stage, the hands on the keys and unable to play. She saw again what happened earlier._

_Self-centered, arrogant, on a pedestal._

_Self-centered, arrogant, on a pedestal._

_Self-centered. _

_Arrogant._

_On a pedestal._

_"Stop" she whispered "Please stop"_

_But it didn't stop, there was no way to stop it. And there it was again: the thought that she wasn't good enough. She hadn't been able to keep a friendship. She felt like it was all her fault, she didn't try enough to fit in. The thought that people changed, that it happened, that friends didn't get along anymore, didn't occur to her._

_A knock on the door took her back to the present moment, she wiped away her tears, and tried to maintain her voice steady._

_"Yes?"_

_"It's me Odette. Can I come in?"_

_"Wait a moment"_

_Annie tried to make herself look presentable, than she took a book from the shelf and sat down on her bed._

_"Do come in"_

_Odette opened the door and walked in. She looked at her sister, there was something wrong with her: she had red and puffy eyes, and looked a lot paler than usual. She walked to her and took her hand._

_"Are you all right?"_

_Annie nodded._

_"It looks like you have cried. How did the afternoon go?"_

_"Bad, but it's unimportant. I'm fine now"_

_"Can I sit down beside you?" asked Odette hesitantly. She wanted to stay near her sister, to show her that she was there with her. She was thirteen but she wanted Annie to open up with her. Something was happening to Annie, and she wasn't the only one to notice it. Her parents tried desperately to let Annie talk, but nothing to do. She was too stubborn to ask for help._

_"Of course little one"_

_Odette curled up near Annie "Are you really all right?"_

_"Yes"_

_The word liar echoed in Annie's mind. _


	15. Chapter 15

**Disclaimer:** I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 15:

Annie was in the car with Cashmere and Johanna, they were heading towards Panem's mall for an afternoon of shopping. Annie was trying not to think about the last time she went to a mall with her friends, but whatever she did the thought was still there. But she could have done this, she could have had fun without her memory wandering back in the past. At the same time she should have probably warned her friends, that it wasn't about them. As always it was about her, about the inability to let the past in the past, and stop it from influencing her.

"I should probably warn you that the last time I went out with friends it didn't end well!" she screamed, trying to speak louder than the radio's volume.

As Cashmere pointed it out earlier: her car, her rules. And this meant to listen to Genesis at the loudest volume possible, mouth the words and tapping the fingers on the steering wheel.

Johanna thought to have heard Annie talking, but with all that noise she wasn't sure. She lowered the volume just to be sure, and Cashmere gave her a threatening glance. Johanna was aware of the fact that Cashmere hated when someone turned down the volume of the radio in her car, but it was necessary.

"Damn Cash, if you could listen to real music it would be acceptable. But listening to Genesis... Urgh!"

Annie repeated her sentence now that the music was just a soft tune.

"Annie, don't get mad, but why do you always feel like you have to excuse yourself?" asked Cashmere. She really couldn't understand it. It happened always, it seemed like Annie was afraid of herself, of how she acted with people. And it was a big mystery. Everyone had a bad day but with her it was different, it was like Annie tried to control how she acted around people and she tried to prevent something. As if she could slip away from her normal self in a matter of minutes and the result of it would have pushed people away.

"No, I just thought it would have been better for you to know"

"What happened? Last time?"

"Differences of opinions among friends" Annie replied simply. She hoped that neither Cashmere nor Johanna would have made more questions. She considered them her friends but she was not ready to open her heart with them, after all she wasn't the same girl anymore. What happened, happened, but it didn't matter anymore.

"Don't worry, you won't have any divergence of opinions. Us - Finnick, Jo, Gloss and me - have them constantly and nothing ever happens. And now: shopping!" screamed Cashmere turning the volume of the radio up again.

Another fifteen minutes ish and they finally arrived. Panem's mall was definitely smaller than 'The Capitol', it looked more inviting: it was small, just two floors, and not very wide. Even the inside was nicer: none of the exaggerated elegance of 'The Capitol'. No fancy fountains, no bright colors, no expensive shops.

"So let's plan our trip!"

"Plan our trip?"

"You have never done that?" asked Cashmere bewildered.

"No?"

Annie was confused, wasn't the point of going to a mall just wandering around and do window shopping?

"Listen this is how it always worked: each of us chooses a shop they want to go to. Then we set up the right amount of time so that the lapse of time is equal, the rest is used to go window shopping"

Now that was something she never heard of. How many people did a detailed shopping trip?

Johanna noticed Annie's facial expression, it reflected her inner struggle to figure out the situation. So she decided to explain it to her.

"We have always done everything together, the problem is: we have all different tastes and once we started to argue because of it. So the solution to the problem was found and since the we have always done it this way. It makes everything easier and no one is allowed to quarrel, because the time is parted up fairly"

"It makes sense"

"Of course it makes sense! We invented it!"

"So where do you want to go?"

"Now that I think about it, I need some summer dresses and a DVD. And don't worry I know exactly how I want the dresses to be. It won't take much time, don't..."

"Worry. Yes, yes, we know"

In the end Annie had to go to buy some clothes, Cashmere some books and Johanna just wanted to wander around in the sport's department. They started from what Johanna wanted to see, waiting patiently as Johanna tried to find a new kimono for her karate course, she nearly started to argue with one of the shop assistant because of the way they answered her when she made a question. Then they went to District eight, where Annie bought some dresses. One of them sleeveless with a floral motif and only because Johanna and Cashmere talked her into it, she hadn't been sure about it was a little too flashy, but as they putted it 'Come on! It suits you, and you could always wear it indoors if you don't trust our judgment' .

"Annie we can send a photo of you in that dress to Finnick. He will give you his honest opinion" Cashmere teased her.

"No. It wouldn't be exactly honest, because Cash let us face the truth, Finnick would say that she is beautiful whatever she wears. He has reached that point of his crush, he needs just to see the word Annie and he is lost! No, Annie you have to trust us"

"No, I'm convinced of it"

"Excellent, trust me we are never wrong when it comes down to fashion!"

"Maybe it's a little exaggeration. But it really suits you, and you should wear it on our next Friday evening"

"I'll do it. Where are we going next?"

"Aga's. It sells books and DVDs, keep your eyes open because I've got a list of titles I need and the more you help sooner we are going away." Cashmere handed out the list of titles and then Annie followed her and Johanna into the shop.

"I found it! I really found it" cheered Cashmere as she picked up a book "You two have no idea how long I looked after it!"

"It's just a book"

Annie looked at Johanna and then at Cashmere. They wouldn't have start to argue, would they? It was not going to be last time, because those were Cashmere and Johanna and they knew each other since childhood and were both aware of the differences between them. But despite her knowledge she still whispered "No". Memories of her being shouted at, came back and she found herself trapped in the past.

"No, it isn't! It's months that I wanted to read it but it was nowhere to be found, not even on the internet"

"Well, now you found it. Let's go" Johanna cut down Cashmere's enthusiasm. She couldn't understand her enthusiasm for a simple book, after all it was just paper.

"Ah Jo, you really don't understand."

"No, I don't. So let's go, your time is up anyway"

_Please stop_

"Calm down Jo!" said Johanna, then she looked up and saw Annie, pale and trembling in front of her. That was the something she noticed: Annie had, for some secret reason, this swings of mood that would have made her change attitude in a matter of minutes.

"Annie, it's all right!"

All right, that came as a big news to her. _All right, all right, all right._ It was nothing serious. She took a few deep breaths and freed her mind from the flashbacks, as everything inside her mind returned normal she smiled at her friends.

"Let's go!" said Johanna grabbing Cashmere and Annie's hands and dragging them to the check out. She was trying to ignore what just happened to Annie. She would have questioned her later, hoping to have some answers even if she wasn't completely sure that Annie would have told her. But it was worth trying, Johanna feared that otherwise one day that girl would have exploded if she kept bottling up all her emotions.

...

"Thanks for the afternoon" Annie said sincerely as she stepped of Cashmere's car. It was true, a part a small incident, she had a lot of fun.

"You're welcome!"

"Annie, we need to talk" added Johanna.

Annie knew what she wanted, but there was no need to talk about what happened. It had been just a small moment of inattention, nothing to worry about. She shook her head slightly and smiled.

"See you! And thanks again!"


	16. Chapter 16

**Disclaimer: **I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 16:

Finnick was lying on a deck chair in his garden under the shade of a tree . It was a beautiful summer day, there weren't any clouds in the sky and a gentle breeze cooled the air, it was perfect to spend time on the outside. But Finnick had another reason to stay outdoors: his parents were home and he tried to avoid them like the plague. He found it too annoying, staying in the same room with two people who did not even acknowledged his existence. The more the distance, the better. So there he was. At first his plans included the new book he bought and he hadn't time to start in the last couple of weeks due to his university exams, but he decided to bring out his laptop. Finnick wanted to look up for something in the internet.

What was that something? Information about Annie Cresta's past.

He was perfectly aware that it wasn't the right way to get information: it was an invasion of Annie's privacy and it looked as if he wanted to gossip about the news he would eventually find. In reality it was nothing like that, he just wanted an explanation about Annie. Nearly a month passed since the first time Annie came to his home to spent the evening with him, Johanna, Cashmere and Gloss and he noticed something, everyone noticed it: as much as Annie opened up, as much as she enjoyed herself and as much as she was put at ease there was always something that stopped herself, he had the sensation that Annie hold herself back from speaking more freely or acting in a more natural way. It didn't happen all the time just now and then, but it happened and it was a clue. And there were also the moments when Annie seemed to wander off with her mind: one word was said and she would momentary disappear. It was something out of Annie's control of that he was sure: her face always reflected her struggle to keep focus on the present moment.

And that was the reason why he was looking for information about her past. He wanted to understand how her mind ticked, only then he could have prevented the episodes to happen. Johanna did the same, with the small difference that she knew Annie's story. He just wanted to help Annie, she was his friend and he knew far too well what it meant living an entire lifetime being influenced by the past. Wasn't he a living proof of it? Didn't he act because of how he was treated by his parents when he was little? Finnick thought that he could help her. But neither Johanna nor Annie wanted to tell him anything, and neither of them would have done it anytime soon. Annie because well... she never talked about it and Johanna because she was one of the most loyal people on earth. Most of the time it was admirable, for the rest of it just annoying. So here he was, waiting for the computer to upload the main internet page.

It was wrong, but he had to do it. Even Mags advised against it when he asked her opinion. "Darling" she said "if she isn't telling something there must be a reason. It's not right looking for it. In the internet further more. If there is one person whose version you have to listen to, its hers. Not the one of some reporters or worse, gossips"

Damn it, Finnick himself wasn't happy to do it. He just wanted to have some answers.

He typed Annie Cresta in the search engine and scrolled down the results.

_Annie Cresta conquered the public..._

_It was announced the name of the guest star of this years Proms..._

_Rising star Annie Cresta is a candidate for a place in Panem's Orchestra..._

"Proms... Proms... Nothing" said Finnick after the first three result pages. All the posts were far too recent, whatever happened to Annie it had to be something older: a couple of years at least. He returned to the main page, but he realized that without knowing the exact period in which the events occurred it was useless. But if Annie was already a rising star...

"She must have made concerts before the Proms" whispered Finnick. And the only way to discover it was going on the main page of Annie's conservatory. They must have a page with their most famous students, or at least some articles considering that Annie participated to one of the most famous events in Panem. And she had to release a CD next year...

"Found it!" he cheered. The conservatory really had pages dedicated to their past and current students: information about their ages, their careers...

_Annie Cresta, born 15/12/-._

_She started taking lessons at the age of four and had her first concert at sixteen. (...) She took part of 'Old Classics reinterpreted' project, playing Chopin in the recording with the same name. (...) This year she opened the Proms (...) and she has a CD release planned for next year, it will include ten original songs written by Annie Cresta herself. For more details about the release __here__._

"Nothing again" he murmured. Was it possible that Annie's life was nowhere to be mentioned? Right, maybe it was a good thing but, right now, it wasn't helping the case. And yet it was strange, considering the amount of things that circulated in the net those days. Everyone knew everything of the others and yet there was absolutely nothing about Annie Cresta.

"How is it even possible?"

He was on the point of giving up, when he saw a link to an interview to her. Why didn't he think of it earlier? Maybe it was nothing written but there was something about the Annie in the old interviews and in the old photos, completely different from the Annie he knew. Not because of her physical complexion: that one didn't change, although she was much more skinny now. It was the way she appeared, acted: less insecure, more happy, less _afraid._

Afraid.

The word popped inside his mind, until now he would have never associated with Annie but when he opened an old interview he saw it. In the elder interviews she appeared far more secure about herself than she was now. In the interviews of the Proms she was all pins and needles, holding herself back.

It wasn't much but it was something.

"So something happened, before she came to Panem. But it's not helping anyway: there are no details."

He could have only make assumptions, and at this point it was really true that the only person who could give him information was Annie herself. And she would have never told him.

_"So Miss. Cresta tell us: how was your passion for the piano start?"_

_"At the age of four. It was love at first sight. I saw..."_

Finnick clicked on an interview of the Proms.

_"So this is your coming back?"_

_"Yes, in a way. I took some time for myself, I had things to do"_

_"And how is it? Returning in such a grand style?"_

_"Marvelous"_

There it was: Annie's hesitation in answering the question, her fear what could have happened next.

"What happened to you? What made you like this?" he said, looking at Annie's image on-screen.


	17. Chapter 17

**A/N: **It took a lot of time due to my university exams, but here it is: Chapter 17. I'm sorry for eventual mistakes. Enjoy!

**Disclaimer: **I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 17:

Annie looked at the clock. She was a little late but if she hurried up she would have made it just in time to meet Peeta, besides she could have always sent a text message. Not that Peeta would have waited alone, Annie was finally going to meet the famous Katniss Everdeen, the girl - just as Peeta always put it - Peeta had a crush on since the age of five. She was a little nervous but that was because she wasn't really good with people, especially strangers. But she looked forward to meet her, after all she heard a lot of good things about her. And if Peeta loved her so dearly she must have been a really special girl.

"Damn it!" she was later than she expected. She begun to run towards Panem's main square to compensate for the minutes spent doing nothing before exiting the house. As she arrived there she was short of breath but was glad to see Peeta and Katniss just come around a corner. So they hadn't waited for her, it was a relief.

"Peeta!" she called out.

"Hi, how are you?"

"I'm fine, but maybe the..." she nodded towards Katniss, who was standing there waiting for something to happen.

"Presentations, yes. Annie this is Katniss. Katniss this is Annie"

Katniss smiled and tried to relax. The situation was a little awkward, she couldn't believe that Peeta actually asked her to meet this girl. She heard about her and knew that she and Peeta were really good friends, but she couldn't see the point in the presentations.

"It's nice to meet you" said Annie with some hesitance. And here all her knowledge about how to behave with complete strangers ended. If a topic was not be introduced soon an uncomfortable silence would have fallen between them.

Peeta looked first at Annie and then at Katniss, they were both looking down at their shoes, probably afraid to start a conversation since they were both a little shy.

"So how much time do we have before you have to go Annie?" he said.

"Well Odette, my little sister that is, arrives at five. So we have a couple of hours"

"You have a little sister?" asked Katniss really interested.

"Yes. She is four years younger than me and is in fact my best friend. You have a sister too I guess"

Katniss nodded. "Prim, and yes we have nearly the same relationship with them"

"How old is she?" asked Annie.

"Seventeen, she is growing up quickly. I'm astonished by it every day, for me she will always be the little girl with her shirt hanging out to form a duck tail" said Katniss with a smile.

It wasn't hard to guess that she was really bound to her sister.

"The same age as Odette. I wonder too about how much she grows up, each time I see her she looks different" And more mature, she wasn't the scared little girl anymore: she was the one worrying about Annie, when it should have been otherwise. Annie felt like she should have looked out for Odette, but in reality it was the opposite. It was as if after her breakdown, Odette took the role of the elder sister.

"They should meet. Who knows they may become best friends" said Katniss, distracting her from her thoughts.

"That would be great"

Now it was Peeta to feel uncomfortable, because Katniss and Annie had just started an intense discussion about sisters and anecdotes about them. He envied close families. No, his family was close if one did not count his mother in the picture.

"I'm afraid we really are excluding poor Peeta from the conversation and we still haven't decided what to do"

"We could go and grab a cold coffee. I would go and eat something but I'm afraid that if I eat now I won't eat at dinner"

"No it's okay" said Peeta. Somehow he feared that the story about the dinner was partly an excuse, but he did not argue about it. At least she was having dinner. He was proud of Annie's progress, when he first met her she was a really nervous girl, now she seemed more relaxed. At ease, and yes appearances were deceiving but this seemed not the case. Hopefully it would have remained like that.

Annie had a lot of fun. Katniss was really a great person, at first she may have seen a little cold and uncaring but once she opened up it was easy to get along with her. At first look it may have not seem like that, but they were pretty similar. Annie was sure that Katniss had something on her heart, her reluctance to talk about certain matters, it was all familiar to her.

The time passed quickly and before she could actually realize it, it was time to go to Panem's central station to reach her sister. She excused herself from Katniss and Peeta but they offered to go with her to keep her company until the train arrived, Annie tried to insist that it wasn't absolutely necessary and she was sure that Peeta and Katniss wanted some time alone, but they were adamant. So they went with her and left her just when the train was arriving to the platform. At that point Annie asked them to stay just to meet her sister but as Peeta putted it 'I'm sure you want some time alone with her. Just pass by the bakery one of this days and we'll meet her then'. In Annie's opinion it wasn't really fair that they waited with her all that time and now they were leaving her and Odette some time alone, but she was reassured that it hadn't been a problem, so she tried to trust them.

The train stopped with a loud noise, Annie checked her phone to see if Odette had written her the number of the wagon she was in, but nothing. The only thing that remained was waiting that her sister came to her and as the crowd thinned out Annie saw Odette running to her, carrying her trolley with one hand and waiving at her with the other.

"Annie! Oh Annie, I'm so glad to see you!" she said, letting all the enthusiasm come out. Nearly a month had passed since the last time Odette saw her sister but it seemed like an eternity for her. She always missed her a lot and the selfish part of her wanted Annie to still live in The Capitol, but she was aware that Annie could have never been happy there. She would have been to subjected to memories and triggers, so it was for the best. And it made her happy that her sister was recovering: Annie seemed irradiating health and happiness, and this was a priceless picture.

"Odds! How are you? And mom and dad? And Pickwick?"

"They are all fine! How are you?"

"I feel brilliant. No lies"

"I wasn't..."

"I know. How was the journey?"

"Not bad but a little long. Have you been waiting for long?"

"No, I was with friends"

"A certain Finnick perhaps?" asked Odette with a sing-song voice.

It seemed to Annie as if it had become her sister's personal mission to make her fall for Finnick. What was possessing everyone these days? First Finnick himself, than Johanna who lately begun to give her hints, now her sister... If she would have spent the next three days listening to monologues about how she and Finnick would have been such a cute couple, she would have put her sister on a train home by force.

"No. Katniss and Peeta"

"Damn it!"

"Odette!"

"Sorry. But you know that Finni..."

"Stop now. Anyway you are going to meet Peeta for sure, he works at the local bakery and they make the best muffins ever. It's a place I have to bring you"

"And will I meet the others too?"

"What? Don't you want to spent time alone with me?" joked Annie.

"Of course I do! But I heard so much about them that I got curious"

"We'll see"


	18. Chapter 18

**Author's note: **I know it's been a while since my last update, I am sorry. This is a short chapter but I hope you will like it anyway.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own 'The Hunger Games', they belong to Suzanne Collins.

Chapter 18:

Annie looked at her sister. She still couldn't believe that Odette was there and would have remained for more than just a couple of hours. It was strange, when they were apart she never realized how much she actually missed her sister: going shopping, watching a movie on TV after dinner and quarreling about stupid matters that were going to be forgotten soon anyway. Annie liked her new loneliness and she loved her new life in Panem - away from the past, from people she once had been closed to - but there were days in her life in which nostalgia just overwhelmed her. It was better now that she had some friends to spent her days with, somehow the distance from her family was felt less when she was with them. But still sometimes at dinner or at lunch, when she sat alone in the kitchen forcing herself to eat more than just a couple of bites images of past days came to her mind.

"It's nice that you will stay with me for a couple of days. I may not admitted when mom and dad are around, but I really miss you all" she said.

"We miss you too Annie, don't think otherwise even though the only thing mom and dad do when they see you is checking out that everything is fine. But they are truly worried and just as I told you last time, they do the same thing with me when I'm going out of the house"

For a moment Annie thought about the last time she had seen her parents, the one time they all started to scream at each other. She was aware that her parents were driven by worry but deep down she hoped that they would have stopped.

"I know Odds, it's just that sometimes it can be quite nerve-wracking"

"There is nothing we can do to stop them, you know that. Annie, What are we going to eat for dinner? And what are we going to do later?"

"As for the dinner: I was thinking about vegetable quiche since I have some leftovers in the freezer"

"Leftovers as in 'I gave a few bites and put it back'? because if that is the case my answer is bleah"

Annie laughed not only because of her sister's words but also because of the grimaces she made: something that mirrored her disgust at the only idea that she had to eat something Annie had already started to eat.

"No, leftovers as in 'I bought two and put one in the freezer'. I'm sorry it won't be anything elaborate"

"Don't worry about that, vegetable quiche is always scrumptious. And after dinner? No, wait I have an idea! Can we please watch The Adventurer? It's been ages since we watched it together last time. Please please please"

'The adventurer: the course of the Midas box' was their favorite film ever since it came out in cinemas, and the 'Mariah Mundi' books inspired the Cresta sister a lot. When they were little whenever they were asked what they wanted to become when they grew up, they answered 'join the bureau of antiquities' , the fact that no one knew what they were talking about made it even more funnier. The faces people made, faces of utter amazement as if the bureau really existed, had always been hilarious.

"It works for me" said Annie as she turned the key in the key hole and made Odette get inside.

She helped her sister unpack her luggage and together they opened the sofa bed in the living room so that they didn't have to do it after dinner, besides they would have been more comfy while watching the movie. As everything had been put in the right place Annie putted the dinner in the oven and helped her sister to lay the table.

"It's really good. Annie, can I ask you something?"

"You already did"

Odette leered at Annie, not amused about her sister's joke.

"Ha-ha. You don't feel stressed because of the CD release, do you? You were not pushed into making the choice of writing your own songs?"

"No, I made it on my own. I am working for it, taking my own time and I do other things too: I have my friends, I go out with them. It's different from last time in every way possible, the details are all different. Why do you ask?"

"I was wondering, and I still worry for you. I shouldn't, but I can't stop doing so. But Annie, if you should feel bad about it can you please tell us all in time?"

Odette looked at her sister, for a moment she thought about last time, the time Annie didn't tell anyone that everything had started to go wrong, that she couldn't cope with her problems anymore. When Annie broke down she was too young to understand the situation entirely but the fright she received had been a turning point in her life. Her nightmares were about losing her sister or about the night when everything changed, her fear was being unable to help Annie with her problems.

"If it should happen again, I promise that I will warn you, mom and dad about it. Pinky promise"

"Fine, and now I have some big news for you. Happy news"

"Tell me"

"I'm going to study history at university: I passed the test!"

"Congratulations! When did you receive the results?"

"A couple of days ago, I wanted to tell you in person and not on the telephone. I still can't believe that they accepted me, it's like a dream come true"

"I know how you feel. I remember all those days when you just talked about historical events the whole day long, sometimes you did get on our nerves you know?"

"I know and I'm going to know even more things which will lead to even more rants. I do that on purpose" said Odette with a smirk.

They both finished their dinner, and after quickly washing the dishes they moved to the living room to watch 'The Adventurer'.


End file.
